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5 THEOLOGICAL  SEMINARY, 
J  Princeton,  N;  J. 


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SKETCHES 


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MORAL  AND  MENTAL 
PHILOSOPHY: 

THEIR  CONNECTION  WITH  EACH  OTHER; 
AND  THEIR  BEARINGS  ON 
DOCTRINAL  AND  PRACTICAL  CHRISTIANITY. 


BF 

THOMAS  CHALMERS,  d.d.&ll.d. 

PROFESSOR  OF  THEOLOGY  IN  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  EDINBUROB, 
4MOOJRRESPONDINO  MEMBER  OF  THE  ROYAL  INSTITUTE  OF  FRAVO. 


NEW  YORK: 

ROBERT  CARTER,  58  CANAL  STREET, 
AND  PITTSBURG,  56  MARKET  STREET. 


1847. 


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https://archive.org/details/sketchesofmoralm00chal_0 


PREFACE. 


There  seems  a  special  necessity  in  the  present 
times,  for  laying, open  to  the  light  of  day  every 
possible  connexion,  which  might  be  fancied  or 
alleged  between  Theology  and  the  other  Sciences. 
All  must  be  aware  of  a  certain  rampant  infidelity 
that  is  now  abroad,  which,  if  neither  so  cultured 
nor  so  profound  as  in  the  days  of  our  forefathers, 
is  still  unquelled  and  resolute  as  ever ;  and  is  now 
making  fearful  havoc,  both  among  the  disciples  of 
the  other  learned  professions,  and  among  the  half 
educated  classes  of  British  society.  The  truth  is, 
that  infidelity,  foiled  in  its  repeated  attacks  on  the 
main  citadel  of  the  Christian  argument,  now  seeks 
for  auxiliaries  from  every  quarter  however  remote 
of  human  speculation.  There  is  not  perhaps  one 
of  the  sciences  which  has  not,  at  some  time  or 
other,  been  pressed  into  the  service ;  and  the  mis¬ 
chief  is,  that,  in  very  proportion  to  their  ignorance 
of  these  sciences,  might  the  faith  of  men  be  un¬ 
settled  by  the  imagination  of  a  certain  wizard 
power,  that  each  of  them,  on  the  authority  of  some 
great  infidel  name,  has  been  said  to  possess — a 
power,  not  only  to  cast  obscuration  over  the  truth 
of  Christianity,  but  bid  the  visionary  fiction  alto¬ 
gether  away  into  the  shades  from  which  it  had 
been  conjured.  And  accordingly,  at  one  time 
there  arose  Geology  from  the  depths  of  the  earth, 
and  entered  into  combat  with  a  revelation,  which, 
pillared  on  the  evidence  of  history,  has  withstood 
the  onset.  At  another,  from  the  altitudes  of  the 


VI 


PREFACE. 


upper  firmament  was  Astronomy  brought  down, 
and  placed  in  hostile  array  against  the  records  of 
our  faith ;  and  this  assault  also  has  proved  power¬ 
less  as  the  former.  Then,  from  the  mysteries  of 
the  human  spirit  has  it  been  attempted,  to  educe 
some  discovery  of  wondrous  spell  by  which  to  dis¬ 
enchant  the  world  of  its  confidence  in  the  gospel 
of  Jesus  Christ ;  and  many  an  argument  of  meta- 
physic  form  has  been  taken  from  this  department 
of  philosophy,  to  discredit  both  the  contents  and 
the  credentials  of  that  wondrous  manifestation; 
and  these  have  been  successively,  though  per¬ 
haps  not  yet  fully  or  finally  disposed  of.  Even, 
in  quest  of  argument  by  which  to  prop  the  cause 
of  infidelity  or  to  find  some  new  plausibility  in 
its  favour,  the  recesses  of  physiology  have  been 
explored;  and  from  Lecture-rooms  of  Anatomy, 
both  in  London  and  elsewhere,  have  the  lessons  of 
materialism  been  given,  and  that  to  the  conclusion 
of  putting  a  mockery  on  all  religion,  and  if  possible 
expelling  it  from  the  face  of  the  earth.  But  per¬ 
haps  the  most  singular  attempt  to  graft  infidelity 
on  any  thing  called  a  science,  is  by  those  who 
associate  their  denial  of  the  Christian  Revelation 
with  the  doctrines  of  Phrenology — as  if  there 
were  any  earthly  connexion  between  the  form  of 
the  human  skull,  or  its  effect  upon  the  human 
character  upon  the  one  hand,  and  the  truth  or 
falsehood  of  our  religion  upon  the  other.  For, 
granting  them  all  their  organs,  it  no  more  tells 
either  to  the  confirmation  or  disparagement  of  our 
historical  evidence  for  the  visitation  of  this  earth 
by  a  messenger  from  Heaven,  than  it  tells  on  the 

historical  evidence  for  the  invasion  of  Britain  bv 

♦ 


PREFACE. 


VU 


Julius  Caesar.  And  we  venture  to  affirm  of  all 
the  other  sciences,  that  no  discovery  has  been  made 
in  any  of  them,  which  is  not  in  e\ery  way  as  incon¬ 
sequential  to  the  point  at  issue;  and  that  the 
truths  of  all  Philosophy  put  together  as  little  inter¬ 
fere  with  the  truths  of  the  Gospel,  as  the  discov¬ 
eries  of  the  astronomer  interfere  with  the  discov¬ 
eries  of  the  anatomist.  But  so  it  is.  While  each 
science  rests  on  an  evidence  of  its  own,  and,  con¬ 
fining  itself  to  its  own  legitimate  province,  leaves  all 
the  other  sciences  to  their  own  proper  credentials 
and  their  own  claims — the  science  of  Theology  has 
been  converted  into  a  sort  of  play-ground  for  all 
sorts  of  inroads,  and  that  from  every  quarter  of 
human  speculation.  Nor  are  we  aware  of  a  single 
science  in  the  vast  encyclopedia  of  human  know¬ 
ledge,  which  has  not,  in  some  shape  or  other,  been 
tnrned,  by  one  or  more  of  its  perverse  disciples, 
into  an  instrument  of  hostility  against  the  Gospel 
of  Jesus  Christ.  Nevertheless  it  too  has  an  evi¬ 
dence  of  its  own,  alike  unassailable  and  beyond  the 
reach  of  violence  from  without.  It  is  not  by  the 
hammer  of  the  mineralogist,  that  this  evidence 
can  be  broken.  It  is  not  by  the  telescope  of  the 
astronomer,  that  we  can  be  made  to  descry  in  it 
any  character  of  falsehood.  It  is  not  by  the  knlie 
of  the  anatomist,  that  we  can  find  our  way  to  the 
alleged  rottenness  which  lies  at  its  core.  Most 
ridiculous  of  all,  it  is  not  by  his  recently  invented 
cranioscope,  that  the  phrenologist  can  take  the 
dimensions  of  it  and  find  them  to  be  utterly  awaat- 
ing.  And  las.dy,  may  it  be  shown,  that  it  is  no’ 
by  a  dissecting  metaphysics,  that  the  philosopher 
of  the  human  miud  can  probe  his  way  to  the 


VUl 


PREFACE. 


secret  of  its  insufficiency ;  and  make  exposure  to 
the  world  of  the  yet  unknown  flaw’,  which  incur¬ 
ably  vitiates  and  so  irreparably  condemns  either  the 
proofs  or  the  subject-matter  of  the  Christian  faicn. 
All  these  sciences  have,  at  on<}  time  or  other,  cast 
their  missiles  at  the  stately  fabric  of  our  Christian 
philosophy  and  erudition;  but  they  have  fallen 
impotent  at  its  base.  They  have  offered  insult 
but  done  no  injury,  siive  to  the  defenceless  youth 
whose  principles  liiey  have  subverted,  or  to  those 
n*en  of  ambitious  vanity  yet  imperfect  education 
whose  little  learning  is  a  dangerous  thing.  If 
pedantry  be  defined  the  untimely  introduction  of 
science,  with  its  imposing  nomenclature,  either 
into  companies  that  cannot  understand  it,  or  into 
subjects  where  it  is  wholly  inapplicable,  then  is  this 
the  most  mischievous  and  unfeeling  of  all  pedantry. 
It  were  well  to  expose  it  and  disarm  it  of  its 
power  over  the  imaginations  of  ignorance — to 
prove  that  Theology  has  an  independent  domain 
of  her  own,  where,  safe  in  her  own  inherent 
strength  and  in  the  munitions  by  which  she  is 
surrounded,  she  can  afford  to  be  at  peace  with  her 
neighbours,  and,  free  from  all  apprehension  or  envy, 
can  rejoice  in  the  prosperity  of  all  the  sciences. 

Analogous  with  these  repeated  attempts  on  the 
part  of  a  vain  philosophy  to  destroy  the  credentials 
of  our  faith,  is  the  attempt,  and  under  the  guise  of 
lofty  science  too,  of  that  transcendental  scripture 
criticism  which  flourishes  in  Germany,  to  vitiate 
and  transform  its  subject-matter.*  Now  the  way 

*  We  all  tlie  more  ■vvillinglv  advert  to  tliis  topic,  that  it  fur¬ 
nishes  the  opportunity  of  expressing  our  regret,  in  not  having 
boen  hitherto  able  from  want  of  room,  to  fulfil  our  intention  of 


I'HLIACE. 


IX 


to  meet  the  ignorant  pedantry  of  this  attempt,  is 
to  make  d'lstinction  between  such  a  scripture-criti¬ 
cism  as  that  which  accomplished  the  English  trans¬ 
lation  of  our  Bible,  and  that  very  best  and  highest 
scripture-criticism,  which,  if  brought  to  bear  on 
this  our  own  popular  version,  might  confer  on  it  the 
utmost  improvement  or  rectification  of  which  it  is 
susceptible.  The  one  might  be  termed  the  ordi¬ 
nary  scripture-criticism  of  which  we  enjoy  the 
benefit  in  our  own  land,  the  other,  the  transcen¬ 
dental  scripture-criticism,  most  cultivated  in  Ger¬ 
many  while  comparatively  unknown  among  our¬ 
selves.  Now  what  we  affirm  is  that  the  ordinary 
scripture-criticism  brings  the  whole  substance  of 
theology  within  our  reach ;  and  that  in  our  autho¬ 
rized  version,  the  product  of  that  scripture  criti¬ 
cism,  not  only  are  all  the  articles  of  theology 
accurately  rendered ;  but  that  every  article  of  the 
least  importance,  whether  estimated  practically  or 
scientifically,  is  therein  to  be  found.  And  it  further 
admits,  we  think,  of  sound  and  impregnable  demon¬ 
stration — that  it  lies  not  within  the  power  of  the 
transcendental  scripture-criticism  either  to  change 
or  to  undermine  this  theology.  It  might  make 
certain  infinitesimal  additions  to  our  former  know¬ 
ledge,  in  things  minute  and  circumstantial,  and  by 
all  means  let  us  have  these ;  but  we  utterly  mis¬ 
take  and  overrate  its  powers,  when  we  think  that, 
by  its  means  we  shall  ever  be  able — either  to 
make  any  material  additions  by  which  to  enlarge, 
or  any  material  alterations  by  which  to  transform 

discussing  the  subjects  of  Scripture  Criticism  and  Systematic 
Theology — a  discussion  that  we  must  now  postpone  to  a  future 
volume  of  the  series. 


z 


PREFACE. 


the  system  of  doctrine,  that,  with  slight  variations^ 
has  been  espoused  by  all  the  reformed  churches  of 
Christendom.  It  might  defend  the  faith ;  but  it 
will  not  enlarge  the  faith.  As  an  instrument  of 
defence  it  is  most  valuable ;  but  as  an  instrument 
of  discovery  it  is  a  microscope,  and  not  a  telescope 
— dealing  in  things  that  are  minute,  but  not  in 
things  that  are  momentous.  There  are  certain 
nuffcs  difficiles  which  it  can  master,  certain 
scriptural  enigmas  which  it  can  resolve,  certain 
eclair cissemens  which  we  should  like  it  to  prose¬ 
cute  to  the  uttermost.  But  as  to  the  capita 
Jidei,  as  to  all  the  moralities  of  the  Christian 
practice,  or  all  the  beads  and  articles  of  the  Chris¬ 
tian  faith,  it  can  make  no  additions  to  these,  it 
can  make  no  changes  on  these.  It  is  powerful  as 
a  protector  of  the  great  truths  we  have ;  but  not 
as  a  discoverer  of  more — as  a  shield  to  our  existing 
orthodoxy,  but  not  as  an  architect  by  which  either 
to  take  it  down,  or  to  substitute  another  orthodoxy 
in  its  place.  We  are  not  refusing  its  pretensions 
to  a  very  high  place  in  our  schemes  of  ecclesiasti¬ 
cal  education  j  for  by  its  means,  we  repel  the  in¬ 
roads  of  heresy,  and  raise  a  bulwark  to  the  faith* 
But  we  utterly  refuse  the  mischievous  pretensions 
which  have  been  made  for  it,  to  amend,  or  to  alter, 
or  even  to  subvert  that  faith.  They  who  put 
forth  such  extravagant  pretensions  wholly  misun¬ 
derstand  the  instrumentality  and  the  functions,  not 
of  the  ordinary,  but  of  the  superlative  scripture 
criticism;  and  this  attempt  to  injure  and  to  un¬ 
settle,  by  means  of  the  science  of  scripture-criti¬ 
cism,  is  of  a  piece  with  the  attempts  to  turn  to  the 
same  unhallowed  purpose  all  the  other  sciences. 


CONTENTS. 


Chav.  L  On  the  Distinction  between  the  Moral  and  Menial 

Philosophy, . 13 

11.  On  the  peculiar  Difficulty  in  the  Study  of  Mind 

which  attends  not  the  Study  of  external  Nature,  59 

III.  On  the  Emotions . 85 

IV.  On  the  Command  which  the  Will  has  over  the 

Emotions,  . . .....130 

V.  On  the  Morality  of  the  Emotions, . 162 


VI.  On  the  Undue  Place  which  is  often  given  to  the 
Emotions,  and  the  delusive  Estimate  of  Human 
Virtue  to  which  it  leads, . 216 

VII.  On  the  Final  Causes  of  the  Emotions,  .  .  .  287 

VHL  On  the  Phenomena  of  Anger  and  Gratitude,  and 
the  Moral  Theory  which  has  been  grounded 
npon  them,  . . 328 

IX.  On  the  Duties  of  Perfect  and  Imperfect  Obligation,  366 

X.  On  Diversities  of  Statement,  in  regard  to  the 
General  Questions  of  Moral  Science,  or  Systems 
of  Moral  Philosophy . 396 


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CHAPTER  I. 


On  the  Distinction  between  the  Moral  and  Mental 
Philosophy. 

1.  The  two  terms  Moral  and  Mental  are  often 
held  as  synonymous  with  each  other.  In  its  primi¬ 
tive  and  right  meaning,  Moral  stands  opposed  to 
vicious  or  immoral,  and  so  is  tantamount  to  the 
virtuous  or  good  in  character.  In  its  later  mean¬ 
ing,  it  stands  contrasted  with  Material ;  and  thus 
by  the  moral  world,  we  are  made  to  understand 
the  world  of  minds — and  so  Moral  Science  is  equi¬ 
valent  to  Mental  Science,  or  that  Philosophy,  the 
object  of  which  is  to  assign  the  laws  and  properties 
of  the  substance  Mind,  in  contradistinction  to  that 
other  Philosophy,  which,  comprehensive  of  many 
sciences,  assigns  the  laws  and  properties  of  the 
substance  Matter.  It  is  thus  that  Moral  Philo¬ 
sophy  has  greatly  widened,  of  late,  the  field  of  its 
topics  and  inquiries;  and,  instead  of  being  what  it 
wont,  a  manageable  and  well-defined  science,  has 
become  a  medley  of  incongruous  subjects — charg¬ 
ing  itself  with  a  sort  of  mastery  or  control  over  all 
the  sciences  ;  and,  on  the  principle  perhaps,  that, 
in  virtue  of  the  cognizance  which  it  takes  of  mind, 


14 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


it  might  extend  this  cognizance  to  all  which  the 
mind  has  to  do  with — making  inroads  on  every 
territory  of  human  speculation,  and  ranging  ini¬ 
mitably  or  at  pleasure  over  all  the  provinces  of 
human  thought. 

2.  It  were  well  to  reduce  this  strange  concre¬ 
tion  ;  or  to  marshal  aright  into  proper  and  distinct 
groups,  the  ill-sorted  members  of  this  vast  and 
varied  miscellany.  And  first,  regarding  the  mind 
as  the  seat  of  certain  affections  and  processes,  we 
would  assign  to  Mental  Science  as  its  legitimate 
and  sole  office,  the  investigation  of  these  viewed 
simply  as  phenomena.  The  record  of  these  would 
form  the  Natural  History  of  the  mind.  The 
classification  of  these  would  form  its  Natural 
Philosophy.  The  Mental  Science  comprehensive 
of  both ;  taking  cognizance  of  aU  the  various  states 
of  mind,  with  the  changes  or  sequences  which  take 
place  on  these  in  given  circumstances,  as  so  many 
facts  which  it  must  describe  aright  and  register 
aright — it  thus  presents  us  with  the  Physics  of  the 
Mind,  with  the  Physiology  of  Dr.  Thomas  Brown, 
with  the  Pneumatology  of  an  older  generation. 
It  is  thus  that  Mental  Science  lies  as  much  within 
the  domain  of  experimental  or  observational  truth, 
as  does  the  Science  of  the  Material  Universe. 
The  one  is  as  much  the  science  of  actual  events  or 
of  existent  objects,  as  the  other.  The  quid  est  of 
Mind,  whatever  can  be  predicated  thereof  as  de¬ 
scriptively  or  historically  true,  belongs  to  Mental 
Science — just  as  the  quid  e.st  of  Matter,  whatever 
can  be  predicated  thereof  as  descriptively  or  his¬ 
torically  true,  belongs  to  Material  Science.  Each 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY. 


15 


is  a  science  of  pure  observation  ;  and  the  Inductive 
Philosophy  of  Lord  Bacon  is  alike  applicable  to 
both. 

3.  But  the  quid  est  is  not  to  be  confounded 
with  the  quid  oportet;  and  Moral  Truth  is  in  every 
way  as  distinct  from  the  facts  or  principles  which 
make  up  the  actual  constitution  of  the  human 
mind,  as  Mathematical  Truth  is  distinct  from  the 
actual  laws  and  properties  of  the  material  world. 
The  question,  What  are  the  affections  or  purposes 
of  the  mind,  is  wholly  distinct  and  dissimilar  from 
the  question  which  relates  to  the  rightness  and 
wrongness  of  these  affections  or  purposes.  My 
knowledge  that  such  a  purpose  or  passion  exists, 
is  one  thing ;  my  judgment  of  its  character  is 
another.  In  the  one  case,  it  is  viewed  historically 
as  a  fact ;  in  the  other  it  is  viewed  morally  as  a 
vice  or  a  virtue.  In  the  one  aspect,  it  belongs  to 
mental ;  in  the  other,  to  moral  science — two 
sciences  distinct  from  each  other  in  nature,  and 
which  ought  never  to  have  been  so  blended,  as  to 
have  been  treated  like  one  and  the  same  science 
in  our  courses  of  philosophy. 

4.  It  is  true  that  every  moral  perception  or 
moral  feeling  has  its  being  or  residence  in  the 
mind ;  but  this  forms  no  greater  reason  for 
Tiewing  moral  as  identical  with  mental  science, 
than  for  so  viewing  any  physical  or  even  mathe¬ 
matical  science.  Every  perception  of  external 
nature,  or  even  of  the  properties  in  geometry,  has 
as  much  its  residence  in  the  mind,  as  have  our 
perceptions  of  Ethical  truth ;  and  the  thing  per¬ 
ceived  should  no  more  be  confounded  with  the 


16 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


perception,  in  the  one  department  than  in  the 
other.  The  objective  truth  is  alike  distinct  from 
the  subjective  sense  or  notion  of  it,  in  all  the 
sciences.  In  looking  to  the  rightness  or  wrong¬ 
ness  of  certain  acts  and  certain  dispositions,  the 
mind  is  no  more  looking  to  itself — than  when 
looking  abroad  on  the  fields,  or  taking  an  obser¬ 
vation  in  Astronomy.  The  judge  on  the  bench 
needs  no  more  have  been  looking  inwardly  during 
the  currency  of  a  protracted  trial,  than  the  mathe¬ 
matician  during  the  whole  process  of  a  lengthened 
algebraical  investigation.  Mental  Science  is  as 
distinct  from  all  other  sciences,  including  the 
ethical  and  the  logical,  as  our  notions  of  things 
are  from  the  things  themselves.  In  the  act  of 
estimating  what  is  right  in  morals,  or  what  is 
sound  in  reasoning,  or  what  is  correct  in  taste, 
we  no  more  look  to  the  mind — than  we  do  in  the 
act  of  estimating  what  is  true  in  Geometry,  or  of 
estimating  any  of  the  properties  of  material  sub¬ 
stances.  If  Mental  Science,  then,  have  absorbed 
the  Moral  and  Intellectual  Sciences,  it  might  claim 
for  itself  the  monopoly  of  all  the  sciences.  Moral 
Philosophy  is  the  Philosophy  of  Morals,  not  tlie 
Philosophy  of  Mind. 

5.  But,  as  we  have  already  in  part  intimated. 
Mental  Science  has  not  only  usurped  the  Science 
of  Ethics,  but  also  Logic  and  the  Philosophy  ot 
Taste.  There  is  no  sufficient  reason  for  this. 
The  mind  is  not  thinking  of  itself  at  all,  in  the 
act  either  of  constructing  a  syllogism,  or  of  pro¬ 
nouncing  on  the  legitimacy  of  its  conclusion.  And 
it  is  as  little  thinking  of  itself,  when  estimating 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY.  17 

the  beauties  of  a  landscape,  as  when  forming  an 
estimate  of  its  magnitudes  and  distances. 

6.  In  spite  however  of  these  considerations, 
there  has  been  in  these  sciences  a  process,  not  of 
further  subdivision,  as  in  the  Philosophy  of  Matter; 
but,  marvellous  to  say,  a  process  of  annexation 
and  •  monopoly.  Once  that  the  Moral  became 
ecfuivalent  to  the  Mental  Philosophy,  then  it 
broke  forth,  by  an  act  of  violent  aggression, 
beyond  the  confines  of  its  own  legitimate  territory, 
and  usurped  a  right  of  cognizance  and  domination, 
not  only  over  the  whole  sciences  of  our  spiritual 
and  intellectual  nature,  but  over  other  sciences 
standing  in  the  same  relation  to  that  of  mind  as 
itself  does.  As  if  the  Ethical  department  did  not 
afford  a  sufficient  range.  Moral  Philosophy  has 
gone  forth,  and  made  forcible  seizure  on  the  prin¬ 
ciples  of  Taste,  on  the  Metaphysics  of  Grammar, 
on  the  w'hole  physiology  of  the  mind,  with  all  its 
feelings  and  all  its  faculties,  and  lastly  on  the  laws 
and  methods  of  the  human  understanding.  It  is 
certainly  strange  that  while  all  other  Philosophy 
is  more  shared  and  subdivided  than  before,  with 
the  accumulation  of  its  materials — all  these  subjects 
should  thus  have  been  heaped  together  into  one 
aggregate  under  the  title  of  Moral  Philosophy,  and 
the  w  hole  burden  of  it  laid  upon  one  solitary  Pro¬ 
fessorship.  Even  centuries  ago,  a  separation  was 
deemed  necessary,  as  may  be  inferred  from  the 
very  existence  in  our  Universities  of  a  Logic  along 
with  a  Moral  Philosophy  class — and  it  does  seem 
inexplicable,  that,  in  proportion  as  truths  otq 
multiplied,  the  smaller  should  be  the  number  of 


18 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


repositories  in  which  they  are  laid.  It  is  thus 
that  Moral  Philosophy  is  now  in  a  state  of  com¬ 
pression;  and  that  its  Lectureship  has,  in  some 
degree,  become  a  heterogeneous  medley  of  topics 
which  are  but  ill  adjusted  with  each  other.  VVe 
have  for  years  been  in  the  habit  of  regarding  this 
not  merely  as  incommodious  for  the  practical 
business  of  a  University  ;  but  in  itself  as  unphilo- 
sophical.  We  hold  the  whole  of  this  domain  to  be 
wide  enough  for  being  broken  down  into  its  sections 
and  its  provinces ;  and,  both  to  reduce  the  plethoric 
magnitude  of  one  subject  as  well  as  to  save  an 
invidious  usurpation  on  the  right  and  property  of 
others,  we  do  think  it  expedient,  that  when  there 
is  for  the  Philosophy  of  Taste  a  class  of  Rhetoric, 
and  for  the  Philosophy  of  Knowledge  a  class  of 
Logic,  the  distinct  and  appropriate  business  of 
this  one  class  should  be  the  Philosophy  of  Duty. 

7.  And  we  apprehend  that  down  to  the  days  of 
Hutcheson,  and  even  of  Dr.  Adam  Smith,  Moral 
Philosophy  was  mainly  and  substantially  the 
Philosophy  of  Morals.  Both  of  these  eminent 
writers  were  chiefly  ethical;  and  did,  we  under¬ 
stand,  in  their  University  courses,  very  much 
confine  themselves  either  to  the  principles  of  virtue, 
or  to  its  motives  and  practical  applications.  It 
was,  we  imagine,  in  the  days  of  Hume,  that  Moral 
Philosophy  first  broke  over  its  original  barriers,  and 
made  the  widest  diffusion  of  itself  throughout  the 
other  departments  in  the  science  of  human  nature. 
Certain  it  is,  that  the  infidelity  of  that  distinguished 
philosopher  bore  a  threatening  aspect  on  the  very 
foundations  of  morality ;  and  called  torlh,  at  his 


MORAL  AN!  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY. 


19 


first  appearance,  a  noble  reaction  of  vigilance  and 
alarm,  on  the  part  of  its  defenders.  Among  these 
the  professors  of  Moral  Philosophy  took,  as  became 
them,  a  conspicuous  place ;  and  seized  on  every 
outpost  of  advantage,  friun  which  they  might  repel 
the  inroads  of  this  wasteful  and  withering  scepticism. 
But  it  was  mainly  a  warfare  on  the  grounds  of 
evidence  or  belief — and  so,  a  careful  review  had 
to  be  taken  of ,  the  intellectual  powers ;  and  the 
champions  of  morality,  directing  their  main  force 
to  the  quarter  of  attack,  felt  themselves  principally 
called  upon  at  that  period  to  guard  and  illustrate 
the  whole  philosophy  of  the  understanding.  It 
was  thus  that  in  the  hands  of  Reid  and  Beattie, 
the  moral  and  the  me?taphysical  came  to  be  so 
intimately  blended;  and  even  after  they  had 
achieved  the  important  service  on  wRich  they  went 
forth,  did  they  still  linger  on  the  field  of  combat, 
and  neither  they  nor  yet  their  successors  have 
retired  within  the  limits  of  the  original  encamp¬ 
ment.  In  this  way  the  proper  and  the  primary 
topics  of  a  Moral  Philosophy  class  have  been  in  a 
great  measure  overborne ;  nor  do  we  see,  in  the 
writings  either  of  Stewart  or  Brown,  any  tendency 
to  restore  these  topics  to  the  place  and  the  pre¬ 
eminence  which  belong  to  them. 

8.  We  are  informed  by  one  of  Dr.  Smith’s 
biographers,  that,  “  In  the  professorship  of  Logic, 
he  soon  saw  the  necessity  of  departing  widely  from 
the  plan  that  had  been  followed  by  his  predeceti- 
sors ;  and  of  directing  the  attention  of  his  pupils 
to  studies  of  a  more  useful  and  interesting  nature, 
than  the  Logic  and  Metaphysics  of  the  schools. 


20 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


Accordingly,  after  exhibiting  a  general  view  of  the 
powers  of  the  mind,  and  explaining  so  much  of  the 
ancient  logic  as  was  requisite  to  gratify  curiosity, 
with  respect  to  the  artificial  mode  of  reasoning 
which  had  once  occupied  the  universal  attention  of 
the  learned,  he  dedicated  all  the  rest  of  his  time 
to  the  delivery  of  a  system  of  Rhetoric  and  Belles 

Lettres _ He  afterwards  became  Professor  of 

Moral  Philosophy  in  Glasgow,  which  he  treated 
purely  as  the  Science  of  Morals,  and  divided  it 
thus  into  four  parts.  The  first  contained  Natural 
Theology,  in  which  he  considered  the  proofs  of  the 
Being  and  Attributes  of  God,  and  those  principles 
of  the  human  mind  upon  which  religion  is  founded. 
The  second  comprehended  Ethics  strictly  so  called. 
In  the  third  he  treated  at  more  length  of  that 
branch  of  morality  which  relates  to  justice;  and 
which,  being  susceptible  of  precise  and  accurate 
rules,  is  capable  of  a  more  systematic  demonstra¬ 
tion.  In  the  fourth  he  explained  those  political 
regulations  which  are  founded  upon  expediency, 
and  which  are  calculated  to  increase  the  riches, 
the  power,  and  the  prosperity  of  a  state.” 

9.  Now  this  may  serve  as  a  specimen  of  what 
Moral  Philosophy  once  was — standing  in  wide 
contrast  to  what  it  now  is,  since  it  suffered  the 
transformation  of  which  we  have  been  speaking. 
When  engaged  in  the  duties  of  a  Professor  of 
Logic,  Dr.  Smith  did  feel  himself  called  upon  to 
exhibit  a  general  view  of  the  powers  of  the  mind, 
and  to  explain  the  most  useful  parts  of  Metaphysics 
. — and,  besides  grafting  the  distinct  subject  of 
Rhetoric  upon  his  course,  to  examine  the  several 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY.  21 

ways  of  communicating  our  thoughts  by  speech. 
And  when  from  this  professorship,  he  entered  upon 
that  of  Moral  Philosophy — instead  of  availing  him¬ 
self,  as  he  well  might,  of  the  preparations  that  he 
had  already  accumulated — if  Moral  Philosophy 
had  then  been  what  it  has  now  become  in  our 
present  day — he  evidently  sets  himself  to  it  as 
altogether  a  new  subject,  and  feels  as  if  he  w  as 
entering  on  a  wholly  distinct  region  of  speculation. 
In  the  sketch  now  given  of  his  labours  in  his  second 
chair,  we  read  of  Natural  Theology,  and  Ethics, 
and  Jurisprudence,  and  Political  Economy — but 
not  one  word  of  Metaphysics.  And  we  venture 
to  afifirm,  that,  without  any  aid  from  this  last 
science,  he  both  conceived  and  brought  to  maturity 
his  most  valuable  speculations. 

iO.  It  is  very  true  that,  in  virtue  of  his  previous 
attentions  to  Logic,  he  might  have  been  better 
qualified  for  the  prosecution  of  his  new  labours  in 
Moral  Philosophy — just  as  a  certain  mathematical 
preparation  is  indispensable  to  the  study  of  Natural 
Philosophy.  But  this  does  not  affect  our  position 
of  the  subjects  being  distinct,  and  that  they  ought 
to  be  laid  on  distinct  professorships.  We  should 
esteem  it  a  most  oppressive  imposition  on  him, 
whose  office  it  is  to  unfold  the  doctrines  of  Natural 
Philosophy — were  he  also  required  to  teach  all  the 
Geometry  and  Algebra,  that  might  be  indispen¬ 
sable  to  the  understanding  of  his  demonstrations. 
And  it  were  surely  equally  unreasonable,  it  were 
blending  two  professorships  into  one,  it  had  to  a 
certain  extent  been  translating  Dr.  Smith  to  sub¬ 
stantially  the  same  professorship  under  a  different 


22 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


name,  should  it  have  been  held  incumbent  on  him, 
or  on  any  of  his  successors  in  office,  instead  of 
laying  an  immediate  seizure  on  the  truth  which 
directly  belonged  to  their  own  appropriate  science, 
to  have  entered  on  an  analysis  of  the  powers  by 
which  truth  is  investigated.  This  is  the  office  of 
another  labourer ;  and,  if  it  must  be  fulfilled  upon 
the  student — ere  he  is  a  fit  subject  for  the  demon¬ 
strations  of  Ethical  Science,  this  is  only  saying 
that  Logic  should  precede  the  Moral,  even  as 
Mathematics  precede  the  Natural  Philosophy. 

11.  But  in  point  of  fact,  the  truths  of  Ethical 
Science  may  be  apprehended  without  any  antece¬ 
dent  investigation  on  our  part  of  the  apprehending 
faculty.  In  like  manner  as  the  visible  qualities  of 
an  object,  may  all  be  looked  to  and  so  ascertained 
without  once  thinking  of  the  eye — so  there  are 
many  thousands  of  objects  in  every  department  of 
Science,  and  Moral  Science  among  the  rest,  which 
may  all  be  regarded  with  most  correct  and  intelli¬ 
gent  observation,  without  the  bestowing  of  so 
much  as  a  thought  on  the  observant  mind.  There 
is  one  philosopher  who  has  outstripped  all  his  pre¬ 
decessors  in  those  high  efforts  of  analysis,  by  which 
he  has  unravelled  the  operations  and  powers  of 
our  mental  system.  But  admitting  the  soundness, 
as  we  do  the  talent  and  originality  cf  hL  specula¬ 
tions,  stiU  we  refuse  to  acknowledge  them  as  fore¬ 
runners  and  scarcely  even  as  auxiliaries  to  the 
study  of  Moral  Philosophy.  We  question  their 
subserviency  to  the  demonstrations  of  Natural 
Theology,  or  Ethics,  or  Jurisprudence,  or  Poli¬ 
tical  Economy.  Admitting  many  of  his  positions 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY. 


23 


regarding  the  Physiology  of  the  mind  to  be  truths, 
still  they  are  truths  irrelevant  to  the  proper  object 
of  Ethical  Science.  And,  however  much  it  may 
startle  the  admirers  of  one  who  emitted  so  power¬ 
ful  a  light  during  his  short  but  brilliant  day,  and 
who  has  left  in  posthumous  authorship  a  monument 
of  proud  endurance  behind  him — ^yet  we  shall 
esteem  the  conclusive  separation  of  his  Mental 
from  the  Moral  Philosophy,  to  be  as  great  a 
deliverance  for  the  latter,  as  Dr.  Smith  seems 
to  have  felt,  when,  departing  widely  from  the  plan 
that  had  been  followed  by  his  predecessors,  he 
cleared  away  from  the  business  of  his  first  pro¬ 
fessorship  the  Logic  and  Metaphysics  of  the 
schools. 

12.  But  this  great  philosopher  himself  is 
thoroughly  aware  of  the  distinction ;  and,  we  think 
too,  must  have  been  aware  of  the  independence  in 
a  great  degree  of  the  two  subjects  of  the  Intellectual 
and  the  Moral  Philosophy.  “  If,  however,  during 
the  flourishing  periods  of  Greek  and  Roman  letters, 
this  intellectual  analysis  was  little  cultivated,  the 
department  of  the  philosophy  of  the  mind,  which 
relates  to  practical  Ethics,  was  enriched,  as  I  have 
said,  by  moral  speculations  the  most  splendid  and 
sublime.  In  those  ages,  indeed,  and  in  countries 
in  which  no  revealed  will  of  Heaven  had  pointed 
out  and  sanctioned  one  unerring  rule  of  right,  it  is 
not  to  be  wondered  at,  that,  to  those  who  were 
occupied  in  endeavouring  to  trace  and  ascertain 
such  a  rule  in  the  moral  nature  of  man,  all  other 
mental  inquiries  should  have  seemed  comparatively 
insignificant.  It  is  even  pleasing  thus  to  find  the 


24 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


most  important  of  all  inquiries  regarded  as  truly 
the  most  important,  and  minds  of  the  highest 
genius,  in  reflecting  on  their  own  constitution,  so 
richly  diversified  and  adorned  with  an  almost 
infinite  variety  of  forms  of  thought,  discovering 
nothing,  in  all  this  splendid  variety  so  worthy  of 
investigation,  as  the  conduct  which  it  is  fitting  for 
man  to  pursue.”  Brown — Lecture  I. 

13.  At  a  time  then  when  the  intellectual  analysis 
was  little  cultivated,  the  department  of  Ethics  was 
enriched  by  splendid  and  sublime  moral  specula¬ 
tions.  We  are  aware  of  a  prejudice  by  which  many 
are  disposed  to  think  that  when  there  is  much 
splendour,  there  is  no  solidity.  But  we  affirm  that 
there  might  be  solid  as  well  as  subhme  moral 
speculations,  by  those  who  cultivate  the  intellec¬ 
tual  analysis  as  httle  as  the  ancients  did — just  as 
a  man  can  not  only  be  dazzled  by  the  glories  of  a 
landscape,  without  so  much  as  the  consciousness 
of  that  retina  which  hath  taken  in  the  impression 
of  it ;  but  can  also  take  accurate  cognizance  of  all 
the  objects  which  are  there  placed  before  him. 

14.  We  regard  splendour  as  at  best  a  very  am¬ 
biguous  compliment,  when  ascribed  to  any  specu¬ 
lation.  But  what  we  contend  for  is,  not  that 
splendid,  but  that  sound  ethical  speculation  may 
be  formed  without  the  aid  of  the  intellectual 
analysis.  We  are  not  at  present  inquiring  into 
the  justness  of  this  analysis,  and  offer  no  reflection 
either  on  the  truth  or  the  importance  of  Dr. 
Brown’s  speculations  on  the  physiology  of  the 
mind.  But  every  thing  in  its  own  place.  And 
what  we  affirm  is,  that,  to  make  the  antecedent 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY. 


25 


knowledge  of  our  mental  frame  in  all  its  parts  a 
preliminary  to  the  study  of  Ethics,  is  just  laying 
as  heavy  and  uncalled  for  a  servitude  upon  this 
subject,  as  it  would  be  to  require  a  familiarity  with 
all  the  methods  of  the  fluxionary  calculus,  ere  we 
admitted  a  scholar  into  the  studies  of  Chemistry. 
It  is  as  competent  a  thing  to  lay  an  immediate 
hand  on  Moral  Philosophy,  without  any  reflex  view 
beforehand  of  the  powers  and  principles  of  our 
mental  constitution — as  it  is  to  lay  an  immediate 
hand  on  the  diagrams  of  Geometry,  without  one 
thought  of  the  constitution  of  that  eye  by  which 
we  are  made  to  perceive  them. 

15.  Dr.  Thomas  Brown,  though  in  practice  he 
followed  the  example  of  his  predecessors — yet, 
aware  of  the  distinction  on  which  we  now  insist 
betw  een  Moral  and  Mental  science,  expresses  him¬ 
self  as  follow's;  “In  one  very  important  respect, 
how^ever,  the  inquiries,  relating  to  the  physiology 
of  Mind,  difier  from  those  which  relate  to  the 
physiology  of  our  animal  frame.  If  we  could 
render  ourselves  acquainted  w  ith  the  intimate  struc¬ 
ture  of  our  bodily  organs,  and  all  the  changes 
which  take  place,  in  the  exercise  of  their  various 
functions,  our  labour,  with  respect  to  them,  might 
be  said  to  terminate.  But  though  our  intellectual 
analysis  were  perfect,  so  that  we  could  distinguish, 
in  our  most  complex  thought,  or  emotion,  its 
constituent  elements,  and  trace  with  exactness  the 
series  of  simpler  thoughts  wdiich  have  progressively 
given  rise  to  them,  other  inquiries,  equally  or  still 
more  important,  would  remain.  We  do  not  know 
ail  which  is  to  be  known  of  the  mind  when  we 

VOL,  V.  B 


26 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


know  all  its  phenomena,  as  we  know  all  which  can 
be  known  of  matter,  when  we  know  the  appearances 
which  it  presents,  in  every  situation  in  which  it  is 
possible  to  place  it,  and  the  manner  in  which  it 
then  acts  or  is  acted  upon  by  other  bodies.  When 
we  know  that  man  has  certain  affections  and  pas¬ 
sions,  there  still  remains  the  great  inquiry,  as  to 
the  propriety  or  impropriety  of  those  passions,  and 
of  the  conduct  to  which  they  lead.  We  have  to 
consider,  not  merely  how  he  is  capable  of  acting, 
but  also,  whether,  acting  in  the  manner  supposed, 
he  would  be  fulfilling  a  duty  or  perpetrating  a 
crime.  Every  enjoyment  which  man  can  confer 
on  man,  and  every  evil,  which  he  can  reciprocally 
in-fiict  or  suffer,  thus  become  objects  of  two  sciences 
— first  of  that  intellectual  analysis  which  traces  the 
happiness  and  misery,  in  their  various  forms  and 
sequence,  as  mere  phenomena  or  states  of  the 
substance  mind ; — and  secondly,  of  that  ethereal 
judgment,  which  measures  our  approbation  and 
disapprobation,  estimating,  with  more  than  judicial 
scrutiny,  not  merely  what  is  done,  but  what  is 
scarcely  thought  in  secrecy  and  silence,  and  dis¬ 
criminating  some  element  of  moral  good  or  evil, 
in  all  the  physical  good  and  evil,  which  it  is  in  our 
feeble  powder  to  execute,  or  in  our  still  fi’ailer  heart, 
to  conceive  and  desire.”  Brown — Lecture  I. 

16.  This  is  not  very  distinctly  expressed ;  ^  and 
yet  we  may  gather  from  it,  how  it  is  that  Moral 
Philosophy  may  yet  be  recalled  from  that  wide 
and  unUmited  survey  which  it  has  lately  taken  of 
our  nature.  In  the  hands  of  some  of  our  most  cele¬ 
brated  professors,  it  has  been  made  to  usurp  the 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY. 


27 


whole  domain  of  humanity — insomuch  that  every 
emotion  which  the  heart  can  feel,  and  every  deed 
which  the  hand  can  perform,  have  in  every  one 
aspect,  whether  relating  to  moral  character  or  not, 
come  under  the  cognizance  of  Moral  Philosophy. 
Now  even  though  Moral  Philosophy  were  to  have 
some  sort  of  reference  to  every  exhibition  that 
humanity  gives  forth,  yet  it  does  not  follow  that 
Moral  Philosophy  should  comprehend  all  that 
might  be  affirmed,  and  affirmed  truly,  of  every 
exhibition.  Geography  has  a  reference  to  every 
one  spot  on  the  surface  of  the  globe ;  but  there  is 
only  one  particular  thing  relating  to  that  spot  of 
which  it  takes  cognizance,  and  that  is  the  local 
position  of  it.  There  are  many  other  things  which 
might  be  affirmed  of  the  same  spot,  wherewith 
strictly  and  properly  Geography  has  nothing  to 
do.  The  flora,  for  example,  of  the  district  be¬ 
longs  to  Botany;  its  subterraneous  productions  to 
Mineralogy;  its  political  revolutions  to  History — 
and,  though  in  geographical  grammars  all  these 
circumstances  are  adverted  to,  yet  there  is  an 
overstepping  on  the  part  of  Geography,  when  it 
extends  its  regards  beyond  the  locality  of  the  place 
in  relation  to  other  countries,  or  its  locality  in 
relation  to  the  mundane  system.  We  have  here 
the  example  of  several  sciences — all  bearing  as  it 
were  on  one  spot  of  earth,  and  each  claiming  its 
own  peculiar  share  of  the  truths  or  the  informations 
which  relate  to  it.  And  so  of  each  action  in  the 
territory  of  human  life — which  may  be  regarded  in 
various  aspects,  and  to  the  production  of  v.hich 
there  behoved  to  be  the  co-operation  perhaps  of 


28 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


many  distinct  feelings  and  faculties  of  our  nature; 
and  which  therefore  in  all  its  circumstances  it  were 
wrong  to  refer  to  Moral  Philosophy,  although  this 
science  has  lately  monopolized  them  all.  A  man, 
for  example,  may  eye  with  tasteful  admiration  a 
neighboui’’s  estate ;  and  he  may  calculate  its  value ; 
and  he  may  feel  a  covetous  affection  towards  it ; 
and  he  may  enter  on  a  series  of  artful  and  unjust 
proceedings,  by  which  to  involve  the  proprietor  in 
difficulties,  and  compel  a  surrender,  and  possess 
himself  of  that  domain  by  the  beauties  of  w'hose 
landscape  he  w^as  at  first  attracted,  and  by  the 
calculation  of  whose  worth  he  was  determined, 
though  at  the  expense  of  rectitude  and  honour,  to 
seize  upon  it.  Now  here  there  are  various  prin¬ 
ciples  blended  together  in  one  exhibition ;  and 
each  coming  forth  into  development  and  display 
within  the  limits  of  one  passage  in  the  history  of 
an  individual.  Each,  wn  say,  belongs  to  separate 
provinces  in  the  philosophy  of  man;  and  Moral 
Philosophy  ought  not  to  have  engrossed  them  all, 
as  it  has  done.  It  belongs  to  the  Philosophy  of 
Taste,  to  take  cognizance  of  that  impression  of 
loveliness  which  man  takes  in  from  external  scenery. 
It  belongs  to  the  Philosophy  of  the  Understanding, 
to  take  cognizance  of  his  intellectual  processes. 
And  it  is  only  with  the  rise  of  the  covetous  affec¬ 
tion,  and  the  promptings  of  it  to  iniquitous  conduct, 
that  Moral  Philosophy  has  properly  to  do.  Each 
of  the  two  first  stands  as  nearly  related  to  the 
human  mind,  as  does  the  last  of  these  sciences — 
the  strict  and  special  province  of  which,  we  again 
repeat,  is  the  Philosophy  of  Duty. 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY.  29 

17.  Before  proceeding  further,  let  us  consider 
shortly,  what  the  precise  thing  is  which  entitles 
this  or  indeed  any  other  subject  to  the  name  of  a 
Philosophy. 

18.  When  one  looks  to  a  multitude  of  objects, 
and  can  see  no  circumstance  of  similarity  between 
them,  each  individual  may  be  the  object  of  a  dis¬ 
tinct  perception — and  each,  perhaps,  may  have 
obtained  a  hold  upon  the  memory  of  the  observer 
— but  in  no  way,  can  they  be  made  the  objects  of 
a  common  philosophy.  It  is  with  resemblances, 
in  fact,  and  with  these  alone,  that  Philosophy  is 
conversant — and  were  each  one  thing  or  event  in 
Nature  unlike  to  every  other,  then  there  could  be 
no  Philosophy — and  that  purely  from  the  want  of 
materials.  The  office  of  Philosophy  is  to  groupe 
objects  or  events  together  according  to  their  resem¬ 
blances — to  put  them  into  classes — and  it  is  some 
certain  likeness  between  the  individuals  of  a  class, 
that  constitutes  what  may  be  called  the  classifying 
circumstance.  The  discovery  of  the  Law  of 
Gravitation,  was  just  the  discovery  of  a  likeness 
between  the  way  in  which  a  stone  is  drawn  to  the 
ground, — and  the  way  in  which  the  Moon  is  drawn 
to  our  Earth,  or  Planets  to  the  Sun,  or  each  one 
particle  of  matter  to  each  other  in  the  universe. 
And  so,  it  will  be  found  from  every  instance^  that 
Philosophy  consists  altogether  in  the  classification 
of  individual  facts — and  that  every  such  classifica¬ 
tion  is  founded  on  some  common  resemblance 
among  the  individuals. 

19.  When  the  individuals  are  without  any 
resemblance,  or  at  least  without  any  resemblance 


30 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


that  is  observed — the  mind  may  still  have  a  regard 
to  them — but  it  cannot  in  any  way  regard  them 
philosophically — and  that,  just  because  they  cannot 
be  associated  together  into  one  object  of  general 
contemplation.  The  state  into  which  the  mind 
is  thrown  when  a  medley  of  dissimilar  objects  is 
made  to  pass  before  it,  may  be  imagined,  in  the 
case  of  an  uninitiated  spectator,  who  has  been 
carried  from  one  apartment  to  another  of  a  very 
crowded  museum.  It  may  be  true  that  a  prin¬ 
ciple  of  classification  reigns  over  all  the  varieties 
of  this  complex  spectacle — but  if  not  palpable  to 
the  eye  of  a  visitor — he  sees  nothing  in  all  that  is 
before  him,  but  a  number  of  unlike  and  uncon¬ 
nected  individuals.  It  must  be  admitted  that 
even  he,  though  he  were  wholly  unpractised  in 
science,  and  still  more,  though  scarcely  advanced 
beyond  the  limits  of  infancy — can  seize  upon  the 
broad  resemblances  of  things,  and  so,  all  uncon¬ 
scious  to  himself,  has  made  some  steps  or  advances 
in  Philosophy.  He  can  recognize  the  general 
similarity  that  runs  through  shells  and  plants  and 
minerals  and  coins,  and  by  which  each  is  arranged 
into  a  generic  class  of  its  own.  But  there  are 
certain  recondite  similarities  which  the  eye  of  his 
observation  has  not  yet  reached — and  in  reference 
to  these,  each  individual  specimen  of  the  same 
family  stands  isolated  and  detached  from  all  the 
others.  And  so  it  is,  that,  while  the  man  of 
science  can  subordinate  into  gradations  and  man¬ 
ageable  parts,  this  whole  contemplation,  the  man 
of  mere  spectacle  is  baffled  and  overwhelmed  by  it. 
He  is  lost  among  those  endless  diversities,  between 


MORAL  ANO  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY. 


31 


which  he  can  perceive  no  tie  of  resemblance  or  re¬ 
lationship — and  retires  from  the  dazzling  confusion 
in  as  great  perplexity,  and  with  fully  as  little  profit, 
as  if  he  had  given  the  perusal  of  many  hours  to  the 

dates  and  the  distances  and  the  offices  and  all  the 

/• 

other  miscellanies  that  lie  scattered  over  the  pages 
of  an  almanac.  Instead  of  the  student  having 
a  master  view  of  the  subject — the  subject  would 
fairly  master  and  overcome  the  student.  It  gives 
to  one  the  same  superiority  over  Nature,  when,  in 
virtue  of  certain  discovered  resemblances,  he  can 
arrange  the  various  objects  which  compose  it 
into  their  respective  departments — that  he  has 
over  the  thousands  of  an  else  undisciplined  mob, 
who,  by  the  word  of  command,  can  marshal 
them  into  the  regiments  of  a  well  ordered  army. 
This  forms  a  main  distinction  between  the  philo¬ 
sopher  and  the  peasant.  The  one  may  be  ;»aid 
to  have  an  intellectual  command  over  the  pheno¬ 
mena  of  Nature,  when  he  groupes  and  arranges 
these  objects  of  his  thought,  according  to  their 
perceived  resemblances  ;  while  the  other,  looking 
upon  Nature  as  a  vast  miscellany,  and  unaware  of 
many  at  least  of  the  resemblances,  views  each 
event  in  its  own  particularity,  and  can  trace  no 
relation  of  likeness  among  the  facts  and  the  pheno¬ 
mena  by  which  he  is  surrounded. 

20.  One  of  our  own  poets  has  said,  that  “  the 
proper  study  of  mankind  is  man” — and  yet  were 
we  to  enumerate  all  the  distinct  acts  of  his  history, 
and  all  the  distinct  exhibitions  of  his  character, 
and  view  them  as  so  many  separate  and  indepen 
dent  facts,  we  should  feel  bewildered  amid  their 


32 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


vast  and  interminable  variety.  The  creature 
appears  to  be  susceptible  of  as  many  influences, 
as  there  are  objects  without  him,  that  may  be 
addrest  to  his  notice,  or  brought  to  bear  upon  any 
of  his  senses — and,  when  under  one  or  other  of 
these  influences,  he  is  seen  at  one  time  to  weep, 
at  another  to  smile  and  look  satisfied,  at  a  third 
to  be  transported  into  anger,  or  love,  or  vehement 
ambition — when  each  of  his  multitudinous  desires 
is  seen  to  break  forth  into  deeds  or  expressions 
that  are  alike  multitudinous — we  should  feel  it  a 
relief  from  the  fatigue  of  such  a  contemplation, 
could  some  common  characteristics  be  seized 
upon,  that  might  assemble  so  mighty  a  host  of 
individuals  into  a  few  species  or  families.  Now 
the  leading  topic  of  an  ethical  course  supplies  us 
at  least  with  one  such  characteristic.  There  is 
an  exceeding  number  both  of  the  outward  acts 
and  the  inward  emotions  of  a  human  being — that 
may  at  once  be  recognized  as  being  morally  right 
or  morally  wrong.  There  is  one  common  aspect 
under  which  they  may  all  be  regarded — and  even 
those  actions  to  which  no  moral  character  may  be 
assigned,  by  being  grouped  together  under  the 
common  title  of  actions  of  in  differ  ence,  are  capable 
of  being  described  with  a  reference  to  the  great 
subject  of  Moral  Philosophy.  It  is  thus  that,  in 
the  treatment  of  this  subject,  we  feel  ourselves 
placed  on  a  vantage-ground,  whence  w^e  may 
survey  the  whole  of  human  life,  and  take  cogni¬ 
zance  in  all  its  phases  and  varieties  of  the  human 
cnaracter — and  from  the  individual  actions  in 
which  there  is  found  to  be  a  moral  rightness,  we 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY. 


33 


can,  in  the  very  way  in  which  a  Philosophy  is 
formed  out  of  the  resembling  facts  in  other  depart¬ 
ments  of  human  investigation,  ascend  from  the 
separate  moralities  of  human  conduct  to  a  Moral 
Philosophy. 

21.  All  are  aware  how  in  the  construction  of  a 
map,  they  can  simplify  and  reduce  to  the  mind’s 
eye  the  whole  geography  of  a  district,  by  one 
leading  line  of  reference,  from  which  all  the  posi¬ 
tions  that  lie  scattered  on  the  surface  of  the  land, 
can  be  thrown  off  in  their  respective  bearings  and 
distances,  from  that  line  to  which  they  have  been 
subordinated.  And  it  is  thus  that  we  may  have 
the  map  of  human  life  submitted  to  our  observa¬ 
tion — by  running  as  it  were  through  the  whole 
moral  territory  the  line  of  unerring  rectitude,  or  if 
more  convenient  the  line  of  demarcation  between 
right  and  wrong ;  and,  from  this,  deriving  an  esti¬ 
mate  of  every  individual  action  that  is  brought 
under  our  cognizance.  It  is  true  that  we  cannot, 
in  this  way,  arrive  at  a  thorough  acquaintance 
with  all  which  may  be  predicated  of  any  given 
action — no  more  than  from  the  chart  of  an  empire, 
we  can  collect  the  population,  or  the  climate,  or 
the  agriculture,  or  the  mineral  and  vegetable 
productions  of  every  given  spot  that  is  within  its 
confines.  But  still  we  obtain  a  certain  informa¬ 
tion  of  every  spot,  for  we  obtain  its  geographical 
position — and  so,  although  it  is  not  the  part  of 
Moral  Philosophy  to  teach  all  that  relates  to  the  feel¬ 
ings  and  the  actions  of  a  human  creature,  although, 
we  must  consult  the  science  of  Pneumatology  and 
the  Philosophy  of  Taste  and  the  Philosophy  of 


34 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


Knowledge  ere  we  can  be  said  to  complete  what 
may  be  called  tbe  Philosophy  of  Man — yet  it  is 
well  that  by  the  means  of  the  Philosophy  of 
Duty,  we  can  command  at  least  one  generalized 
view  of  human  life ;  and  bring  within  the  sweep 
as  it  were  of  one  comprehensive  estimate,  what 
might  otherwise  have  lain  as  so  many  loose  and 
scattered  individualities  along  the  track  of  a  man’s 
history  in  the  world. 

22.  The  mind  feels,  nothing  but  defeat  and 
difficulty  among  a  multitude  of  individuals — but 
when  it  can  seize  upon  some  one  quality  that  is  com¬ 
mon  to  them  all,  then,  by  means  of  this  as  a  family 
likeness,  it  is  invested  with  a  certain  ascendancy 
over  the  subject,  and  can  bring  it  within  the  limits 
of  one  general  contemplation.  That  quality 
which  it  is  the  part  of  Moral  Science  to  find  in 
human  actions,  and  by  which  it  arranges  them 
into  classes  of  its  own,  is  their  moral  rightness. 
This  it  finds  to  be  attached  to  an  exceeding  diver¬ 
sity  both  of  the  doings  of  a  man’s  history,  and  the 
feelings  of  his  heart — and,  in  the  act  of  regarding 
these,  it  rises  to  a  very  extended  review  of  our 
nature.  But  the  mei'e  magnitude  of  its  survey 
is  exceeded  by  the  vast  importance  of  it — an 
importance  which  is  directly  announced  to  us  by 
the  very  name  that  is  given  to  this  Science — and 
by  which  we  learn  that  the  whole  question  of  moral 
good  and  evil  is  submitted  to  its  cognizance. 
There  is  an  intrinsic  greatness  in  the  question 
itself,  apart  from  its  bearing  upon  every  other 
interest — and  this  is  enhanced  to  the  uttermost, 
when  we  further  think  how  momentous  the  interests 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY. 


35 


be  which  are  suspended  on  the  resolution  of  it — 
when  we  reflect  on  the  moral  state  of  man,  as  it 
infers  a  certain  connexion  with  the  God  who  is 
above  him,  and  a  certain  consequence  in  the  Eternity 
that  is  before  him, — and  when  in  the  things  about 
which  this  science  is  conversant,  we  behold  not 
merely  the  most  urgent  and  affecting  concerns  of 
a  present  world,  but  that  they  form  as  it  were  an 
opening  vista  into  the  magnificence  and  glory  of  a 
world  which  lies  beyond  it. 

23.  It  is  the  natural  and  we  believe  the  almost 
constant  practice  of  every  instructor,  to  expatiate 
on  the  great  worth  if  not  the  superiority  of  his 
own  assigned  portion  in  the  encyclopedia  of  human 
knowledge.  So,  that  at  the  opening  of  every 
academic  course,  the  student  in  passing  from  one 
introductory  lecture  to  another,  may,  amid  the 
high-coloured  eulogies  which  are  pronounced  upon 
all  the  sciences,  be  at  a  loss  how  to  assign  the  rank 
and  the  precedency  of  each  of  them.  It  is  the 
very  perfection  of  the  divine  workmanship  that 
leads  every  inquirer  to  imagine  a  surpassing  grace 
and  worth  and  dignity  in  his  own  special  depart¬ 
ment  of  it.  Yet  surely  it  is  not  possible  to  be 
deluded  by  any  over- weening  estimate  of  a  theme, 
which  reaches  upwards  to  the  high  authority  of 
heaven,  and  forward  to  the  destinies  of  our  im¬ 
mortal  nature. 

24.  And  here  it  occurs  to  us  to  say,  that  it 
gives  a  unity  and  a  simplicity  to  our  contempla¬ 
tions  of  human  life,  somewhat  akin  to  the  effect 
that  is  produced  by  the  generaliiations  of  philo¬ 
sophy,  when  we  look  to  man  in  d  ose  greater 


36 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


elements  of  his  being,  and  according  to  the  high 
relationships  in  which  he  stands  to  the  God  who 
called  him  into  existence,  and  to  the  coming  futu¬ 
rities  of  an  existence  that  is  endless.  When  man 
lives  at  random,  and  under  the  ever-varying  impulse 
of  the  objects  which  surround  him,  he  is  like  a  tra¬ 
veller  entertained  perhaps  at  every  new  turn  and 
evolution  of  the  scenery  through  which  he  passes  j 
but  who,  all  unconscious  of  the  geography  that  is 
before  him,  is  lost  and  bewildered  among  the 
mazes  of  an  unknown  land.  But  let  him  rise  to 
the  top  of  a  commanding  eminence,  and  the  whole 
prospect  is  submitted  to  him — and  descrying,  as  . 
he  now  may,  both  the  near  and  distant  objects  of 
the  landscape,  he  can  both  so  take  his  aim,  and 
guide  his  direction,  as  might  give  a  design  and  a 
consistency  to  all  his  movements.  And  so  of  him, 
who  rambles  through  life  without  one  thought  of 
the  presiding  authority  that  is  above,  or  the  great 
everlasting  that  is  before  him — and  with  whom 
each  day  has  its  own  peculiar  walk,  but  not  one 
day  all  the  while  spent  with  any  practical  or  decided 
reference  to  the  coming  immortality.  He  lives  in 
a  sort  of  hourly  fluctuation  among  the  currents 
that  play  and  circulate  within  the  limits  of  this 
world — ^but  he  lives  without  any  general  drift  that 
sets  in  his  hopes  or  his  pursuits  or  his  wishes  upon 
another  world.  It  is  the  doctrine  of  a  moral 
government  that  has  omnipotence  for  its  head,  and 
for  its  issues  a  deathless  futurity — it  is  this  which 
places  the  traveller  through  life  on  the  very  emi¬ 
nence  that  gives  him  to  see  afar,  and  with  a  reach 
of  anticipation  that  overpasses  the  intermediate 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY.  37 

distance  between  him  and  the  grave — it  is  this 
which  sublimes  humanity,  and  carries  it  beyond 
the  confines  of  earth  on  which  humanity  has  but 
for  a  few  little  years  to  expatiate — it  is  this  which 
reduces  the  perspective  of  existence  to  its  greater 
lineaments ;  and,  instead  of  a  desultory  creature, 
at  the  mercy  of  a  thousand  lesser  and  fortuitous 
influences,  it  is  this  which  establishes  the  footsteps 
of  man  on  a  loftier  path,  and  causes  every  aim  and 
every  movement  to  bear  upon  the  mark  of  a  high 
calling. 

25.  'But  it  is  worthy  of  remark — that,  just  as 
we  sublime  the  prospects  of  humanity,  we  simplify 
them.  We  become  conversant  with  greater  ele¬ 
ments — but  though  great,  they  are  few,  as  has 
been  well  observed  of  Astronomy  the  most  magni¬ 
ficent  of  all  the  sciences,  and  yet  in  one  respect 
the  simplest  of  them  all — because  of  the  one  or 
two  forces  that  act  on  the  great  masses  of  the  sys¬ 
tem, — and  whereof  the  resulting  phenomena  can 
be  far  more  easily  traced,  than  those  which  pro¬ 
ceed  from  the  more  complex  relations,  whether  of 
Chemistry  or  of  the  Animal  and  Vegetable  Phy¬ 
siology.  And  so,  of  the  celestial  in  Morality  as 
well  as  in  Physics.  We  are  as  it  were  raised  by 
it  above  the  intricacies  of  a  terrestrial  maze — and 
if,  among  the  cloudless  transparencies  of  the  region 
to  which  we  have  been  elevated,  we  are  more 
familiar  with  greatness,  w'e,  while  looking  down  on 
the  earth  that  is  beneath  and  onward  to  the 
radiant  heaven  after  which  we  aspire,  are  less  be¬ 
wildered  by  complexity  than  before.  And  here 
perhaps  the  difference  between  Knowledge  and 


38 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


Wisdom  may  be  made  apparent.  On  the  one 
hand  it  is  possible  to  know  much,  and  yet  be  des¬ 
titute  of  wisdom;  and  on  the  other  hand  to  be 
wise,  though  in  possession  of  very  few  materials  of 
knowledge.  This  difference  is  well  exemplified 
by  a  Christian  peasant  and  a  man  of  the  world — 
the  latter  of  whom  knows  life  in  its  modes  and 
phases  and  according  to  the  varieties  of  a  multi¬ 
plied  experience — and  the  former  of  whom,  ignor¬ 
ant  of  all  these  particulars,  knows  it  in  relationship 
to  the  eternal  fountainhead  whence  it  has  issued,  to 
the  path  of  righteousness  along  which  it  must  run, 
and  the  immeasurable  ocean  of  bliss  and  glory  into 
which  it  falls  at  the  outlet  of  our  earthly  dissolu¬ 
tion.  The  few  great  simplicities  of  his  state  are 
the  all  with  which  he  is  conversant ;  and  his  wisdom 
lies  in  the  recognition  that  he  makes  of  their  worth 
and  their  greatness — a  recognition,  not  by  the  con¬ 
sent  of  the  understanding  only,  but  by  the  con¬ 
formity  of  his  whole  heart  and  habit  to  the  import¬ 
ant  realities  wherewith  he  has  to  do.  For  wisdom 
includes  in  it  something  more  than  discernment — 
it  is  discernment  followed  up  by  the  adoption  of  a 
right  choice  and  a  right  conduct.  It  has  in  it 
more  of  a  practical  character  than  belongs  to  mere 
knowledge,  or  even  to  judgment — for  it  not  only 
perceives  such  truths  as  are  addrest  to  it,  but  it 
also  proceeds  upon  them — and  we  repeat  of  many 
an  unlettered  sage,  that,  solely  because  he  has 
seized  on  the  few  greater  elements  of  Humanity, 
and  admitted  them  to  have  the  ascendancy  over 
him — there  is  a  reach  and  a  dignity  about  the 
whole  man  which  mere  Philosophy  cannot  attain 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY. 


39 


to — a  pure  and  elevated  serene,  that  is  not  to 
be  disturbed  by  those  earth-born  anxieties  which 
tyrannize  over  the  hearts  of  ordinary  men — even  a 
grace  and  propriety  in  all  his  movements,  because 
each  is  in  keeping  with  one  another,  and  with  the 
grand  purpose  of  existence — a  march  of  consistency 
through  the  world,  that  gives  somewhat  the  gait 
of  nobility  even  to  the  humble  occupier  of  a  cottage, 
who,  in  walking  with  his  God,  feels  a  gathering 
radiance  upon  a  path  that  is  enlightened  from 
above,  and  that  bears  him  onward  to  the  realms  of 
immortality. 

26.  We  may  readily  conceive  the  mastery,  which 
it  gives  to  an  inquirer  over  all  the  phenomena, 
which  are  offered  to  his  notice,  on  any  given  subject 
of  contemplation — when  he  is  put  into  the  posses¬ 
sion  of  some  leading  principle,  which  is  adapted  to 
all,  and  gives  a  place  and  a  subordination  to  all. 
It  is  thus  with  the  law  of  gravitation,  when,  by 
the  aid  of  mathematics,  it  is  made  to  harmonize 
into  one  simple  and  beautiful  principle  all  the 
intricacies  of  our  planetary  system.  And  it  is  thus 
too  with  certain  laws  in  Political  Economy,  by  which 
a  determinate  impulse  is  given  to  the  mechanism 
of  trade — and  whole  classes  of  phenomena  are 
reducible  to  one  compendious  expression.  And 
it  is  thus  too  that  a  habit  of  mind,  like  unto  that 
which  is  acquired  by  him  who  is  much  exercised 
among  the  generalizations  of  Philosophy,  is  exem¬ 
plified  by  the  Christian  peasant — for  he  also  is 
daily  and  familiarly  conversant  with  the  most  sub¬ 
lime  of  all  generalizations.  There  is  with  him, 
one  great  interest  that  absorbs  all  the  lesser  in- 


40 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


terests  of  his  being — a  high  relationship  with  his 
Creator,  to  which  the  countless  influences  that 
play  upon  his  moral  system  from  all  parts  of  the 
surrounding  creation  are  made  most  thoroughly 
subordinate — one  magnificent  and  engrossing  aim, 
in  the  prosecution  of  which  he  becomes  familiar 
with  great  conceptions,  and  rises  to  a  sort  of 
mental  ascendancy  over  all  the  diversities  of  visible 
existence,  as  he  thinks  of  the  God  who  originated 
all,  and  of  the  eternity  which  is  to  absorb  all — 
one  complete  and  comprehensive  rule  of  righteous¬ 
ness  that  is  suited  to  all  the  varying  circumstances 
of  humanity ;  and  in  the  ^application  of  which  he 
can  pervade  the  whole  of  life  with  one  character, 
just  as  the  philosopher  can  pervade  all  the  pheno¬ 
mena  that  lie  in  the  field  of  his  contemplation 
with  some  one  law  or  principle  of  nature.  And 
so  religion  and  morality  do  more  than  exalt  the 
imagination  of  a  peasant.  They  elevate  the  whole 
cast  of  his  intellect.  They  familiarize  him  to 
abstractions  which  are  altogether  akin  with  the 
abstractions  of  Philosophy.  The  man  who  has 
become  a  Christian,  can,  on  that  very  account, 
look  with  a  more  philosophic  eye  than  before  over 
the  amplitudes  of  nature — and,  accustomed  as  he 
now  is  to  a  generalized  survey  of  human  life  and 
its  various  concerns,  he  can  the  more  readily  be 
made  to  apprehend  the  reigning  principle  which 
assimilates  the  facts  and  the  phenomena  in  any 
one  department  of  investigation  that  has  been 
offered  to  him.  Hence  it  is,  that  it  has  so  often 
been  distinctly  observed — how  the  reformation 
which  gives  a  new  heart,  also  brings  in  its  train  a 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY.  41 

new  and  a  more  powerful  understanding  than 

before _ how,  at  this  transition,  the  whole  man, 

not  only  softens  into  goodness,  but  brightens  into 
a  clearer  and  larger  intelligence — how,  more  parti¬ 
cularly,  instead  of  being  lost  as  before  among  the 
endless  specialities  which  lie  in  Nature  or  in  the 
multitude  of  its  individual  objects,  all  untutored 
as  he  has  been  in  the  schools  of  Philosophy,  he  is 
now  capable  of  lofty  and  general  speculation ;  and, 
with  the  faith  which  has  now  entered  into  his 
bosom,  he  has  received  at  the  same  time  the  very 
elements  of  a  philosophical  character. 

27.  It  is  this  alliance  between  the  understand¬ 
ing  and  the  heart — it  is  the  undoubted  fact  that 
he  who  has  practically  entered  upon  the  general¬ 
izations  of  moral  and  religious  principle,  is  all  the 
more  fitted  thereby  for  entering  upon  the  gene¬ 
ralizations  of  science — it  is  the  way,  in  which 
however  we  may  explain  it,  the  purity  of  one’s 
character  gives  a  power  and  a  penetration  to  his 
intellect — it  is  the  connexion  between  the  single¬ 
ness  of  an  eye  that  is  set  upon  virtue,  and  such  an 
openness  to  the  truth  which  beams  upon  us  from 
every  quarter  of  contemplation  as  to  make  the 
whole  man  full  of  light — it  is  this  which  makes  it 
pertinent,  and  before  we  have  at  all  entered  on  the 
philosophy  of  Moral  Science,  to  bid,  as  the  best 
preparation  for  its  lessons,  a  most  devout  and 
deferential  regard  to  the  lessons  of  conscience. 
There  is  nought  of  the  science,  and  nought  of  the 
direct  observations  of  Astronomy,  in  the  simple 
notice  to  its  pupils  that  they  should  frequently 
repair  to  the  observatory,  and  avail  themselves  of 


42 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


the  instruments  which  are  provided  there — yet, 
anterior  to  all  demonstration,  it  is  entirely  in  place 
to  deliver  such  an  intimation  at  the  very  outset  of 
their  study  of  the  heavens.  And  when  entering 
on  the  study  of  their  moral  nature,  although  no¬ 
thing  may  have  yet  been  said  that  has  in  it  much 
of  the  precision,  or  even  much  of  the  phraseology 
of  science — yet  that  is  said  which  is  practically  of 
importance  to  know,  if  we  tell  at  wdiat  post  and  in 
what  attitude  we  are  upon  the  best  vantage-ground 
for  the  discernment  of  its  truths — if  we  proclaim 
the  affinity  which  obtains  between  a  correct  per¬ 
formance  of  the  duties,  and  a  clear  perception  of 
the  doctrines  of  morality;  and  make  it  our  initial 
utterance  on  the  Mdiole  matter,  that,  like  as  an 
unclouded  atmosphere  is  the  essential  medium 
through  \vhich  to  descry  those  ulterior  objects  that 
are  placed  on  the  field  of  contemplation — so  it  is 
the  serene  which  gathers  around  a  mind  unclouded 
by  remorse,  and  free  from  the  uproar  of  guilty 
passions  or  guilty  remembrances,  that  forms  the 
medium  through  which  the  truths  of  moral  science 
are  seen  in  their  brightest  lustre,  and  so  are  most 
distinctly  and  vividly  apprehended. 

28.  It  forms  part  of  the  business  of  this  science, 
to  arrange  according  to  the  methods  of  philosophy, 
the  feelings  and  the  faculties  of  our  moral  nature. 
But  it  is  w'ell  in  the  meantime  for  its  students,  to 
cherish  these  feelings  and  put  these  faculties  into 
busy  exercise.  It  is  thus  that  ere  the  speculation 
is  formed,  they  become  familiar  as  it  were  with  its 
raw  or  primary  materials — and  wdll  be  in  far  better 
circumstances  afterwards  for  understanding  the 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY.  43 

place  and  the  functions  of  that  moral  sense  which 
is  within  them,  if  now  they  give  most  faithful 
attendance  to  all  its  intimations.  There  is  not  a 
day  of  their  lives  that  does  not  supply  a  multitude 
of  occasions,  upon  which  this  inward  monitor  may 
lift  up  his  voice,  and  bring  before  the  cognizance 
of  their  judgment  the  whole  question  of  the  distinc- 
tioir  between  right  and  wrong — and  it  must  make 
all  the  difference  imaginable,  whether  they  be  in 
the  habit  of  hstening  to  the  voice,  or  of  turning  a 
deaf  ear  and  an  unimpressed  heart  away  from  its 
suggestions.  It  is  thus  that  as  the  will  becomes 
more  depraved,  the  understanding  becomes  darker, 
and  the  two  act  and  leact  with  a  fearful  operation 
of  mischief  the  one  upon  the  other — insomuch  that 
the  sophistry  from  which  we  have  most  to  appre¬ 
hend,  in  finding  our  way  through  the  intricacies  of 
the  subject,  is  the  sophistry  of  evil  habits  and  of 
evil  affections. 

29.  But  however  important  Moral  Philosophy, 
in  its  own  separate  and  distinctive  character,  may 
be — we  must  not  forget  that  sciences,  though  dis¬ 
tinct,  may  yet  stand  related  to  each  other ;  and 
while  we  view  the  Mental  as  diverse  from  the 
Moral  Philosophy,  we  must  not  overlook  the  con¬ 
nexion  between  them.  There  is  one  respect 
indeed  in  which  the  Mental  stands  related  to  all 
the  Sciences — mind  being  the  instrument  for  the 
acquisition  of  them  all ;  and  the  whole  of  our  know¬ 
ledge  therefore,  throughout  its  various  branches, 
having  the  same  sort  of  dependence  on  the  nature 
of  the  mind,  that  perception  has,  not  on  the  thing 
perceived,  but  on  the  nature  of  the  percipient 


44 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


faculty.  There  are  besides  emergencies  in  the 
history  of  science,  which  might  call  for  a  recurrence 
to  the  laws  and  constitution  of  the  human  under¬ 
standing — questions  of  perplexity  or  doubt,  which 
can  only  be  decided  by  an  appeal  to  the  ultimate 
principles  or  tendencies  of  our  intellectual  nature. 
The  scepticism  of  Berkeley  and  Hume,  for  ex¬ 
ample,  when  these  philosophers  denied  the  exist¬ 
ence  of  the  material  world,  may  be  said  to  have 
struck  at  the  whole  Philosophy  of  External  Nature. 
It  had  to  be  met  by  the  assertion,  of  the  deference 
that  we  owed,  or  rather  of  the  deference  that  all 
men  actually  paid  and  were  irresistibly  constrained 
to  render,  to  our  instinctive  principles  of  belief. 
In  like  manner,  when  men  had  forsaken  the  path 
of  observation,  and  sought  after  truth  by  a  creative 
process  of  their  own — they  were  at  length  reclaimed 
from  this  great  error  of  the  middle  ages,  by  an 
inductive  philosophy  which  may  be  said  to  have 
made  proclamation  of  the  laws  and  limits  of  the 
human  understanding.  And  so  also  the  sureness 
and  stability  of  all  physical  science  depends  on  the 
constancy  of  nature  ;  and  we  can  imagine  that  men 
will  arise,  to  question  the  grounds  of  our  belief  in 
this  constancy,  so  as  to  undermine  our  confidence  in 
the  doctrines  or  averments  of  our  existing  Philoso¬ 
phy.  This  also  is  met,  and  can  be  adequately  met 
in  no  other  way,  than  by  a  statement  of  our  faith  in 
the  constancy  of  nature,  as  a  mental  law  the  autho¬ 
rity  of  which  is  recognized  and  obeyed  by  all  men. 
It  follows  not,  however,  that,  ere  the  properties 
or  laws  of  matter  can  be  ascertained,  the  laws  of 
mind  must  have  been  previously  investigated,  or 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY.  45 

that  the  study  of  mind  is  anterior  to  all  other 
study.  Men  go  forth  on  the  arena  of  all  the 
sciences,  without  any  preparation  of  this  sort,  in 
the  vigorous  and  healthful  exercise  of  such  facul¬ 
ties  as  they  find  to  be  within  them,  and  under  the 
impulse  of  such  tendencies  as  the  strong  hand  of 
nature  hath  implanted— and  might  make  sound 
progress  in  all,  as  unconscious  of  a  Mental  Phy¬ 
siology,  as  the  thousands,  who  trust  and  trust  aright 
in  the  informations  of  their  eyesight,  are  uncon¬ 
scious  of  the  retina  that  is  within  them. 

30.  But  Mental  Science  stands  in  a  still 
more  close  and  peculiar  relation  to  the  other 
Sciences,  than  to  those  which  are  usually  deno¬ 
minated  physical,  and  which  belong  to  the  Philo¬ 
sophy  of  Matter.  It  is  true  that  in  the  study  of 
Logic,  the  mind  is  not  employed  in  the  investiga¬ 
tion  of  its  own  phenomena,  at  the  time  when 
employed  in  investigating  the  differences  between 
good  and  bad  reasoning.  But  an  extreme  scep¬ 
ticism  might  throw  us  back  on  the  Mental  Philo¬ 
sophy,  by  forcing  us  to  vindicate  the  procedures  of 

Logic _ which  cannot  always  be  done,  without 

vindicating  and  so  describing  the  procedures  of  the 
human  understanding.  When  the  results  of  ab¬ 
straction  and  comparison  and  inference  come  to  be 
questioned,  it  might  often  be  necessary  to  take 
cognizance  of  these  respective  faculties  of  the 
mind,  and  of  the  methods  of  their  operation.  Yet, 
in  performing  the  direct  business  of  Logic — in 
estimating,  either  the  truth  of  the  premises  in  the 
syllogism  or  the  soundness  of  the  deduction  that  is 
made  from  them — the  mind,  when  so  occupied, 


4G 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


might  be  as  far  removed  from  the  consideration  of 
itself  or  its  own  properties,  as  when  giving  the  full 
intensity  of  its  regards  to  a  diagram  in  Mathema¬ 
tics  or  to  a  specimen  in  Natural  History.  In  the 
act  of  framing  a  system  of  Logic,  the  direction  of 
the  mind  is  altogether  objective.  But  in  defend¬ 
ing  that  system,  the  mind  may  have  to  look  sub¬ 
jectively  to  its  own  powers  and  its  own  processes. 

31.  But  there  is  more  than  this  to  be  said  for 
the  part  which  Mental  Science  has  in  the  Philo¬ 
sophy  of  Taste.  It  is  not  that  the  states  of  emo¬ 
tion,  including  the  emotions  of  beauty,  are  so  many 
mental  phenomena — for  they  are  not  more  so  than 
the  intellectual  states  are ;  and  it  is  only  in  the 
act  of  holding  converse  with  the  objects  of  taste, 
that  these  emotions  do  arise — insomuch  that  we 
no  more  look  to  the  mind  in  estimating  the  beauty 
of  an  object,  than  in  estimating  the  truth  of  a  pro¬ 
position  in  any  of  the  physical  sciences.  So  that 
in  constructing  a  Philosophy  of  Taste,  or  in  learn¬ 
ing  that  Philosophy  if  already  constructed,  we  for 
far  the  greater  part  are  employed  objectively. 
And  yet  there  are  certain  questions  which  properly 
belong  to  this  Philosophy,  but  which  cannot  be 
resolved  without  a  subjective  consideration  of  the 
mind  and  of  its  processes.  As  an  example  of  this, 
we  might  refer  to  the  celebrated  question  of  the 
effect  of  association  in  matters  of  taste ;  or  whe¬ 
ther  the  grace  and  grandeur  which  we  feel  to  be  in 
material  objects  be  owing  to  any  inherent  quality 
in  themselves,  or  to  the  ideas  which  are  suggested 
by  them  and  which  are  not  material — as  ideas  of 
power,  or  danger,  or  utility,  or  of  certain  of  the 


47 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY. 

graces  and  virtues  of  the  human  character.  Now 
the  fact  of  such  association,  if  true,  is  a  mental 
pnenomenon.  The  rapidity  wherewkh  it  is  per¬ 
formed  is  a  mental  process.  And  m  the  act  of 
considering  these,  we  are  directly  employed  on  the 
treatment  of  a  question  in  Mental  Science.  In 
this  instance.  Mental  Science  lends  a  contribution 
from  itself  to  the  Philosophy  of  Taste— nor  is  that 
Philosophy  completed,  without  laying  hold  of  a 
doctrine  or  a  phenomenon  in  Mental  Science,  and 
making  it  a  component  part  of  its  own  system. 

32.  But  Mental  Science  makes  still  larger 
contributions  to  the  Philosophy  of  Morals;  and 
the  latter  is  still  more  dependent  on  the  former, 
for  the  solution  of  certain  of  its  questions.  It  is 
true  that  the  great  bulk  of  ethical  questions  are 
prosecuted,  altogether  apart  from  the  consideration 
of  the  mind  or  any  of  its  phenomena,  so  as  fully  to 
warrant  the  treatment  of  the  Ethical  and  Mental 
as  two  distinct  sciences.  Yet  ethical  science  would 
not  be  completed,  and  certain  of  its  most  interest- 
ino-  doctrines  or  difficulties  would  remain  unsettled 
—If  we  did  not  call  in  the  aid  of  the  Mental  Philo¬ 
sophy  for  the  determination  of  them.  Thus,  after 
the  establishment  of  the  maxim  that  nothing  is 
virtuous  or  vicious  which  is  not  voluntary,  we 
must,  before  pronouncing  upon  the  virtuousness 
of  certain  affections,  make  sure  that  the  will  has 
to  do  with  them.  It  is  thus  that  the  virtuousness 
of  a  right  belief  and  the  virtuousness  of  certain  of 
the  enmtions,  as  of  gratitude  for  example,  require 
tor  their  demonstration  that  we  should  advert  to 
the  constitution  of  the  mind,  and  evince  therefrom 


18 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


the  dependence  of  an  intellectual  state  in  the  one 
case,  and  of  a  state  of  emotion  in  the  other,  on 
certain  antecedent  volitions  which  had  given  them 
birth.  And  there  is  one  very  celebrated  question 
wherewith  the  science  of  morals  is  most  intimately 
concerned — that  which  respects  the  freedom  of 
human  agency.  Abstractly  speaking,  this  ques¬ 
tion  lies  within  the  department  of  the  Mental 
Philosophy;  but  as,  in  the  estimation  of  many, 
the  character,  nay  the  very  being  of  morality, 
depends  on  the  decision  of  it — it  is  the  part  of  all 
who  are  interested  in  Moral  Science,  to  look  after 
this  decision  ;  and,  more  especially,  is  it  incumbent 
on  the  expounders  of  this  science,  to  watch  over 
an  inquiry  the  results  of  which  are  conceived  to 
bear  with  an  import  so  momentous,  and  even  with 
an  aspect  so  menacing  on  the  whole  of  that  subject 
matter  which  so  peculiarly  belongs  to  them.  The 
professor  of  Moral  Science  ought  not  to  shrink  then, 
from  taking  a  part  in  the  much  agitated  controversy 
between  the  contingency  and  the  necessity  of 
human  volitions ;  and,  on  whichever  side  the  deter¬ 
mination  is  given,  it  is  also  his  part  to  consider  in 
what  way  the  moral  character  of  men’s  acts  or  of 
men’s  dispositions  is  affected  by  it — and,  more  espe¬ 
cially,  whether  either  virtuousness  or  viciousness 
can  be  predicated  of  any  performance  that  is  done, 
or  any  purpose  that  is  conceived  by  a  voluntary 
agent,  should  the  whole  line  of  his  history  be  as 
certainly  determined,  as  is  the  path  of  a  planet  in 
the  firmament.  In  deciding  on  this  latter  ques¬ 
tion,  cognizance  must  be  taken,  not  only  of  our 
moral  judgments  and  feelings,  viewed  as  pheno- 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PIIILOSOPIIV.  49 

mena;  but  of  the  precise  circumstances  in  which 
they  are  called  forth — and  when  thus  engaged  we 
are  dealing  with  Mental  Science — we  are  taking 
a  direct  vievv  of  the  mind,  in  one  of  its  most  inter¬ 
esting  evolutions. 

33.  But,  beside  the  common  relation  in  which 
these  three  sciences  stand  to  the  Mental  Philoso¬ 
phy,  they  have  also  certain  mutual  affinities  among 
themselves.  For  example,  there  is  a  margin  or  a 
debateable  border-ground  between  the  Philosophy 
of  Knowledge  and  the  Philosophy  of  Duty,  of 
which  each  may  claim  a  share;  or,  rather,  of 
which  both  may  be  regarded  as  the  joint  proprie¬ 
tors  of  the  whole.  We  have  already  intimated  as 
a  maxim,  that  whatever  comes  within  the  province 
of  duty  must  be  dependent  on  the  human  will; 
that  no  action  can  be  designated  as  right  or  wrong, 
unless  a  previous  volition  have  been  of  influence 
to  call  it  into  being;  that,  ere  the  character  of 
virtue  or  vice  can  be  assigned  to  any  state  of  mind, 
and  along  with  it  all  the  responsibility  which 
attaches  to  character,  that  state  must  be  resolvable 
either  into  an  act  or  a  habit  of  choice  on  the  part 
of  its  owner.  Now  such  is  the  actual  machinery 
of  the  human  constitution,  that  the  will  and  the 
understanding  do  have  a  reciprocal  action  the  one 
upon  the  other — and,  through  the  medium  of  atten¬ 
tion,  a  man  can,  at  his  own  bidding,  turn  his 
intellectual  faculties  to  some  given  quarter  of  con¬ 
templation  ;  and  so  become  deeply  censurable  for 
his  habitual  negligence  of  questions,  that  rightfully 
challenged  his  utmost  reverence  and  regard  for 
tiiem.  The  relation  that  there  is  between  the 

VOL.  V,  C 


bO  DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 

state  of  a  man’s  will  and  of  his  opinions,  is  a  topic 
that  has  its  occupancy  on  the  margin  to  which  we 
now  referred — and  by  investigating  which,  light 
may  be  thrown  upon  the  inquiry  in  how  far  man 
is  accountable  for  his  belief,  and  in  how  far  his 
belief  may  operate  either  to  the  perversion  or  the 
establishment  of  his  moral  character.  The  way 
in  which  right  volitions  conduct  one  to  right  views, 
and  the  way  in  which  right  views  serve  to  inspire 
and  to  sustain  right  volitions,  we  hold  to  be  a  most 
interesting  portion  of  that  middle  ground  which  lies 
between  the  moral  and  the  intellectual  philosophy ; 
Nor  will  it  be  found  that  the  purely  ethical  doc¬ 
trine  stands  so  disjoined  in  connexion  or  influence 
from  the  other  sciences,  if  it  be  true  as  has  been 
strenuously  asserted  by  Dr.  Campbell,  that  worth 
and  simplicity  of  heart  give  a  mighty  aid  even  to 
the  investigation  of  speculative  truth — that  they 
infuse,  as  it  were,  a  clearer  element  into  the 
region  of  our  intellectual  faculties — and  that  there 
is  a  power  in  moral  candour  which  not  only  gives 
more  of  patience  to  our  researches,  but  even  more 
of  penetration  to  our  discernment. 

34.  And,  in  like  manner,  does  the  province  of 
Moral  Duty  overlap  to  a  certain  extent  the  pro¬ 
vince  of  Taste — and,  in  so  far  as  it  does  so,  it 
offers  to  us  so  much  space  of  a  common  or  inter¬ 
mediate  character.  To  philosophise  the  whole  of 
the  latter  department  is  the  proper  business  of 
another  Science — but  Moral  Science  does  not 
overstep  her  own  rightful  or  legitimate  boundaries, 
when  it  offers  to  expatiate,  not  merely  on  the 
grounds,  but  also  on  the  gracefulness  of  human 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY.  51 

Virtue _ when  it  inquires  in  how  far  the  loveliness 

that  stands  imprest  on  visible  and  inanimate  things, 
might  be  resolved  into  the  charm  of  a  moral 
association — or,  adverting  to  the  way  in  which, 
through  the  medium  of  physiognomy,  the  worth 
and  excellence  of  the  unseen  mind  can  be  put  forth 
in  such  form  and  colouring,  as  might  picture  to 
the  eye  its  modesty,  or  its  gentleness,  or  its  kind 
affection,  or  its  serene  and  manly  determination, — 
when  it  suggests  the  probability,  that,  with  so 
many  alliances  between  the  spiritual  and  corporeal 
parts  of  our  nature,  there  might  go  forth  the  ex¬ 
pression  of  a  character  on  the  flowers,  and  on  the 
landscape,  and  on  the  varying  tints  of  4he  sky, 
and  on  all  the  materialism  by  which  we  are  sur¬ 
rounded.  One  thing  is  certain  that  virtue  is  the 
object  of  a  tasteful,  as  well  as  of  a  moral  admira¬ 
tion  ;  that  there  is^in  it  what  may  be  called  a  sort 
of  transcendental  beauty,  to  which  an  homage  is 
yielded  that  is  altogether  akin  to  the  delight  we 
feel  in  music  or  in  scenery ;  that  this  is  an  emotion 
in  which  even  the  worthless  can  sympathise — and 
be  made  to  acknowledge  that  untainted  delicacy 
and  devoted  patriotism,  and  unswerving  truth, 
and  honour  fearless  because  unimpeachable,  and 
everbreathing  humanity,  and  saintly  or  angelic 
holiness— that,  after  all,  these  and  such  as  these 
are  the  fairest  blossoms  in  the  garden  of  poetry. 
Thus  far  might  Moral  Science  make  incursion 
upon  the  region  of  Taste — and  that,  not  to  regale 
the  imagination,  or  idly  to  deck  its  own  lucubra¬ 
tions  ;  but  to  fetch  even  from  this  fairy  border, 
some  grave  and  important  materials  wherewith 


52 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


to  inform  the  judgment,  and  to  probe  a  most  in¬ 
structive  way  among  the  arcana  of  our  moral  nature. 

35.  And  there  is  one  most  important  practical 
inference,  to  be  drawn  from  this  conjunction  be¬ 
tween  the  moral  and  the  tasteful  in  human  nature. 
If  virtue  be  an  object  of  taste  as  well  as  a  matter 
of  obligation — then  it  is  a  conceivable  thing,  that 
it  may  continue  to  be  felt  as  the  one,  after  that  as 
the  other  it  has  been  utterly  fallen  from.  Now 
should  this  conceivable  thing  turn  out  to  be  real — 
should  it  be  found  of  one  w^hose  moral  principles 
have  been  vitiated  by  self-indulgence,  that  still  he 
can  be  regaled  with  the  graces  of  a  fine  moral 
exhibition,  just  as  he  can  enjoy  the  luxury  of  any 
pathetic  or  theatrical  emotion — should  it  be  found 
furthermore,  that  this  is  a  sentimentalism  not  con¬ 
fined  to  those  rarer  instances  of  Depravity,  when 
much  of  what  may  be  called  the  poetry  of  a  man’s 
character  has  survived  the  utter  ruin  of  his  prin¬ 
ciples  ;  but  that,  in  fact,  it  overspreads  the  whole 
face  of  every-day  life,  so  that  it  might  nearly  be 
said  of  all  who  still  are  abundantly  capable  of  a 
passing  tribute  to  the  grace  and  the  goodliness  of 
virtue,  that  nevertheless  they  each  make  a  divinity 
of  his  own  will,  and  practically  breathes  in  no 
other  element  than  that  of  selfishness — then  is 
there  room  for  this  weighty  and  warrantable  infer¬ 
ence,  that,  with  all  the  complacency  of  their 
exquisite  feelings  and  their  tender  recognitions  on 
the  side  of  virtue,  still  their  conscience  and  their 
life  might  be  utterly  at  war  with  their  imagination : 
Or,  in  other  words,  that  whatever  remainder  of 
moral  sensibility  may  still  exist  like  the  fragments 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOrHY. 


53 


of  a  lovely  or  a  venerable  wreck  in  their  consti¬ 
tution,  nevertheless  this  sore  distemper  is  upon 
them,  that  the  hourly  and  the  perpetual  habit  is 
at  variance  with  those  lofty  aspirations  after  excel¬ 
lence  whereby  they  occasionally  are  visited,  and 
they  continually  disown  in  practice  what  in  descrip¬ 
tion  and  in  theory  they  admire. 

36.  But  with  all  these  admitted  relations  among 
the  sciences  of  which  we  now  speak,  it  is  philo¬ 
sophically  of  great  and  obvious  importance  that 
each  science  should  be  rightly  distinguished  from 
all  the  others  ;  and  thus  be  made  to  stand  in  its 
own  place,  and  to  rest  on  its  own  proper  and  inde¬ 
pendent  evidence.  It  would  put  out  the  light  of 
many  a  false  analogy ;  and  strip  of  their  dangerous 
authority,  those,  who,  because  eminent  in  one 
department,  have  made  presumptuous  inroad  on 
another  that  perhaps  was  altogether  foreign  to  it. 
Had  each  inquiry  been  confined  within  its  own 
rightful  limits,  we  should  not  have  heard  a  crude 
geology  from  the  lips  of  the  mere  theologian ; 
nor  would  an  infidel  philosophy,  as  in  the  person 
of  La  Place,  elated  by  the  triumphs  it  had  won 
on  the  field  of  astronomical  science,  rushed  un¬ 
bidden  and  unwarranted  on  the  Christian  argu¬ 
ment.  The  violence  that  is  thus  often  done  to 
the  strict  philosophy  of  the  subject,  is  not  the  only 
evil  to  he  deprecated,  from  the  confusion  or  the 
misplaced  interference  of  one  science  with  another. 
There  is  a  greater  evil  to  be  apprehended  of  a 
moral  or  a  practical  kind — as  giving  to  scepticism 
the  semblance  of  a  deep  philosophy ;  and  thus 
arming  it  with  a  sort  of  superstitious  sway  over 


54 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


the  prostrate  understandings  of  men,  who,  if 
unable  to  comprehend  its  demonstrations,  are  yet 
in  danger  of  being  bewildered  and  misled  because 
alike  unable  to  refute  them.  Let  the  imagination 
be  once  given  way  to,  of  some  mysterious  connex¬ 
ion  between  the  mental  and  the  moral  sciences  ; 
and  then,  as  from  the  depths  or  the  arcana  of  some 
hidden  region,  might  the  specious  fallacy  be  con¬ 
jured  up,  by  which  to  undermine  the  foundations 
of  the  Ethical  Philosophy,  and  to  cast  an  obscura¬ 
tion  over  its  clearest  principles.  It  is  to  save 
this  mischief,  that  we  labour  to  manifest  the  dis¬ 
tinction  between  these  two  sciences — insomuch 
that  the  first  elements  of  the  one  are  beyond  the 
reach  of  an  *  possible  discovery  which  can  be  made 
in  the  othei.  Our  knowledge  of  the  morally 
right  and  wrong,  does  not  hang  on  our  knowledge 
of  the  mental  physiology.  The  informations  of 
these  two  different  sciences  ought  no  more  to  be 
confounded,  than  the  informations  that  we  obtain 
by  the  means  of  two  different  senses.  Those 
realities  of  sight  of  which  we  know  by  one  inle% 
can  sustain  no  possible  discredit,  from  those 
realities  of  sound  of  which  we  know  by  another 
inlet.  And  so  it  is  of  the  Moral  and  the  Mental 
Philosophy.  Each  has  its  own  peculiar  walk ; 
and  each  lights  us  onward  from  doctrine  to  doc¬ 
trine,  by  a  peculiar  evidence  of  its  own. 

37.  And  if  Moral  Science  have  suffered  from 
its  fancied  dependence  on  another  science ;  to 
whose  tribunal  it  is  liable  to  be  brought,  and  by 
whose  award  some  have  conceived  it  must  stand 
or  fall — certain  it  is  that  Christianity  has  suffered 


moral  and  mental  philosophy.  55 

to  a  tenfold  greater  extent  from  the  same  cause. 
Infidelity  may  be  said  to  have  drawn  its  missiles 
of  attack  from  all  the  sciences  ;  and  Geology,  and 
Astronomy,  and  Metaphysics,  beside  other  sciences 
of  lofty  pretension  and  formidable  name,  have 
been  set  forth  as  containing  within  their  hidden 
repositories,  some  truth  of  deadly  import,  that,  in 
the  hands  of  an  able  assailant,  might  be  wielded 
to  the  subversion  of  the  faith.  And  thus  it  is, 
that  had  the  aim  been  as  effective  as  it  was  meant, 
Christianity  must,  long  ere  now,  have  received  its 
sentence  and  its  death  blow,  at  the  hand  of  Philoso¬ 
phy,  in  some  one  or  other  of  its  branches.  We  have 
already  said  that  the  certainties  of  one  science  can 
have  no  effect  in  displacing  the  equal  certainties  of 
another  science;  but,  strange  to  say,  the  uncer¬ 
tainties  of  almost  all  the  sciences,  have  been  held 
to  be  of  sufficient  authority,  for  displacing  the 
certainties  of  the  Christian  Revelation — as,  for 
example,  the  uncertainties,  or  as  they  have  been 
termed  the  visions  of  Geology,  to  displace  the 
informations  of  the  best  and  surest  of  those  histo¬ 
rical  vouchers  which  have  come  down  to  us  from 
ancient  times.  It  seems  to  have  been  forgotten 
of  our  religion  that  it  is  based  upon  facts,  sus¬ 
tained  by  that  very  evidence  which  has  given  to 
modern  science  all  its  solidity  and  all  its  elevation — 
the  evidence  of  the  senses  with  its  first  promulgators ; 
and  the  evidence  of  their  testimony,  transmitted 
on  a  firm  pathway  to  all  future  generations ;  and 
to  which  we  add,  the  evidence  of  consciousness, 
that  has  well  been  termed  the  faculty  of  internal 
observation,  and  by  which  an  unlearned  man  of 


56 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


piety  and  prayer  obtains  the  same  kind  of  demon¬ 
stration  for  the  truth  as  it  is  in  Jesus,  that  he  has 
for  the  reality  of  his  own  thoughts.  These  are 
the  evidences  which  uphold  Christianity  as  a  stable 
and  independent  system  of  truth,  resting  on  a 
foundation  of  its  own ;  and  which  can  no  more  be 
shaken  by  the  hostility  of  foreign  sciences,  than  by 
any  irrelevancies  which  are  altogether  foreign  to 
the  question.  And  yet  what  a  dangerous  fascina¬ 
tion  has  their  eminence  won  on  other  fields,  thrown 
around  the  names  of  our  most  distinguished  scep¬ 
tics  ;  and  with  what  a  mighty  yet  sorely  misplaced 
authority  has  their  general  reputation  as  philoso¬ 
phers  or  savans  invested  them — as  Laplace,  illus¬ 
trious  in  mathematical  science;  and  Hume  in 
metaphysical;  and  Voltaire  in  wit  and  poetry, 
and  the  playfulness  of  a  pen  that  flew  with  every 
wind,  and  ever  flung  abroad  from  its  prolific  stores 
some  new  brilliancies  to  enrich  and  enliven  the 
literature  of  his  country;  and  lastly  Rousseau 
with  sentiment  and  eloquence  of  a  profounder  cast, 
and  whose  very  misanthropy,  issuing  from  the 
bower  of  his  chosen  retirement  as  from  the  bosom 
of  some  mysterious  cavern  and  uttered  in  notes  of 
deepest  pathos,  gave  a  sort  of  oracular  power  to 
the  sentences  of  his  dark  and  distempered  infidelity. 
And  yet  they  never  fully  grappled  with  the  ques¬ 
tion  as  eruditionists,  or  held  up  to  it  in  sober  and 
sustained  earnest,  the  lights  of  criticism  and  his¬ 
tory;  and  far  less  did  they  condescend  to  the 
subject  matter  of  Christianity,  or  take  account  of 
its  marvellous  adaptations  to  the  actual  state  and 
felt  exigencies  of  human  nature.  Yet  these  are 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY.  57 

the  only  real  and  competent  evidences  on  which 
to  decide  the  question ;  and  so  Christianity  hath 
stood  its  ground  amid  all  the  noise  and  splendour 
of  its  adversaries — for  if  these  had  forced  a  sur¬ 
render,  it  had  been  like  a  citadel  of  strength 
stormed  by  a  display  of  fireworks.  But  though 
the  enduring  and  indestructible  church  weathers 
all  these  assaults  of  infidelity,  yet  countless,  not¬ 
withstanding,  is  the  number  of  individual  victims 
who  are  immolated  at  its  shrine ;  and  thousands, 
tens  of  thousands  there  are,  who,  simply  because 
these  men  have  written,  have  lived  in  guilt  and 
died  in  thickest  darkness.  That  ignorance  is  the 
mother  of  devotion  is  a  maxim  applicable,  not  to 
the  votaries  of  drivelling  superstition  alone ;  but  it 
has  had  full  and  fatal  verification  also  among  the 
worshippers  of  infidel  genius.  The  neologists  of 
Germany  have  caused  too  many  to  believe,  that, 
from  the  profundities  of  German  criticism,  they 
have  drawn  up  the  secret  which  gives  another 
meaning  to  the  records  of  our  faith,  and  so  changes 
altogether  the  substance  and  character  of  Christi¬ 
anity  ;  and,  in  like  sort,  has  infidelity  deluded 
many  into  the  imagination,  that,  from  the  hidden 
depths  of  that  wisdom  and  philosophy  which  some 
of  its  own  most  accomplished  disciples  have 
explored,  the  secret  has  been  drawn,  by  which, 
not  only  to  change  the  character  of  Christianity, 
but  to  destroy  its  existence.  In  both  the  illusion 
'is  upheld  through  the  same  means — the  illegiti¬ 
mate  authority  of  great  names  over  minds  spell¬ 
bound  and  held  in  thraldom  by  their  own  ignorant 
admiration.  And  in  both,  the  illusion  is  dissi- 

c  2 


58 


DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE 


pated  in  the  same  way — by  exposing  the  imagi¬ 
nary  connections  which  have  been  alleged,  and 
often  too  for  the  purposes  of  infidehty,  between 
one  science  and  another,  and  keeping  each  science 
within  its  own  proper  sphere.  Philosophy  evinces 
her  highest  wisdom,  when  recognising  and  respect¬ 
ing  the  limits  of  the  territory  which  belongs  to 
her.  When  she  oversteps  these,  it  ceases  to  be 
wisdom,  and  degenerates  into  pedantry — which 
may  be  defined  the  unwarranted  intrusion  of  learn¬ 
ing  either  into  companies  who  do  not  understand 
it,  or  into  subjects  to  which  it  is  altogether  in¬ 
applicable.  It  is  thus  that  the  sophistries  of 
Hume  in  our  own  country  have  been  pretty  welt 
disposed  of;  and  thus  too,  may  it  be  shown,  in 
the  face  both  of  French  infidelity  and  of  German 
freethinking,  that  Christianity  is  impregnable  and 
that  orthodoxy  is  safe. 

38.  We  do  not  say  that  for  the  direct  teaching 
or  enforcement  of  Christianity,  it  is  indispensable 
that  one  should  be  accomplished  in  all  the  sciences. 
But  we  say  it  is  most  desirable  for  Christianity, 
exposed  to  random  assaults  from  every  quarter  of 
possible  speculation,  that  it  should  rank  some  of 
every  science  among  its  defenders  and  its  friends. 
And  there  is  a  higher  wisdom  than  the  doctrines 
and  lessons  of  any  science  can  communicate,  which 
is  of  mighty  avail  for  the  defence  of  our  faith 
against  the  unlicensed  inroads  of  an  ambitious  and 
vain  philosophy — a  wisdom  that  arbitrates  among 
all  the  sciences,  saying  to  each  of  them  “  Thus  far 
and  no  further  shalt  thou  go” — assigning  to  each 
respectively  its  own  strict  and  legitimate  province 


MORAL  AND  MENTAL  PHILOSOPHY.  59 

_ drawing  around  each  its  proper  limitations.  It 

is  such  a  wisdom  as  Bacon  exemplified  in  Philoso¬ 
phy;  and  it  is  for  a  Bacon  in  Theology  to  demon¬ 
strate  the  repeated  injuries  which  she  has  sustained 
from  the  unlawful  trespasses,  that  in  the  name  of 
Philosophy,  have  been  committed  on  the  domain 
which  rightfully  and  exclusively  is  hers. 


CHAPTER  II. 

On  a  peculiar  Difficulty  in  the  Study  of  Mind 
which  attends  not  the  Study  of  external  Na¬ 
ture. 

1 .  What  we  have  already  said  will  at  once  suggest 
a  distinction  in  Moral  Science,  between  the  objec¬ 
tive  and  the  subjective  part  of  it.  Virtue  may  be 
looked  to  abstractly  and  in  itself ;  or  it  may  be 
looked  to  as  exemplified  by  a  human  being,  when 
the  topic  of  contemplation  may  be  that  whole  pro¬ 
cess  of  thought,  and  sentiment,  and  purpose,  and 
finally  of  deed  or  execution,  that  is  undergone  by 
him.  It  is  obvious  that  we  cannot  rightly  acquit 
ourselves  of  this  latter,  that  is  the  subjective  part 
of  Moral  Science,  wdthout  drawing  upon  Mental 
Science,  without  taking  cognizance,  not  of  the 
nature  of  virtue,  but  of  the  nature  of  man, — his 
moral  nature,  or  the  machinery  of  his  moral  judg¬ 
ments,  and  feelings,  and  efforts,  and  performances. 
Now  in  these  we  behold  so  many  operations  or 
phenomena  of  mind;  and,  in  other  words,  there 


60 


A  PECULIAR  DIFFICULTY  IN 


are  certain  questions  in  which  the  two  philosophies, 
the  Moral  and  the  Mental,  however  distinct  and 
distinguishable  from  each  other,  are  intimately 
blended.  • 

2.  There  are  two  of  the  human  faculties  which 
stand  alike  distinct  from  each  other;  and  it  is 
remarkable,  that  the  same  confusion  has  taken 
place  in  our  view  of  the  faculties,  that  we  have 
already  complained  of  as  having  taken  place  in 
our  view  of  the  objects  of  them.  These  are  Con¬ 
science  and  Consciousness — the  one  being  the 
faculty  that  is  cognizant  of  the  morally  good  and  the 
morally  evil ;  the  other  the  faculty  that  is  cognizant 
of  what  passes  in  the  breast,  or  rather  that  by  which 
a  man  becomes  privy  to  what  has  taken  place  in 
the  history  of  his  own  life,  as  well  as  to  the  feel¬ 
ings  and  phenomena  of  his  own  mind.  This  latter 
faculty  has  been  denominated  the  faculty  of  inter¬ 
nal  observation.  It  is  by  this  faculty  that  we  are 
imagined  to  take  an  immediate  view  of  the  world 
that  is  within — even  as  by  the  senses,  we  take  an 
immediate  view  of  the  world  that  is  around  us. 

3.  This  has  given  rise  to  the  conception  of  a 
certain  peculiar  difficulty  in  the  study  of  Mind,  to 
which  we  are  not  exposed  in  the  study  of  external 
Nature. 

4.  But  let  it  be  remembered  that  all  Philosophy 
consists  in  the  classification  of  facts;  and  that 
therefore,  when  we  study  the  Philosophy  of  Matter, 
we  must  look  towards  matter  and  take  note  of  the 
facts  and  the  phenomena  which  it  exhibits  with  a 
view  to  their  classification.  And  in  like  manner 
when  we  study  the  Philosophy  of  Mind,  the  mind 


THE  STUDY  OF  MIND. 


61 


is  regarded  by  us  as  the  subject  of  certain  facts 
and  certain  phenomena,  which  we  arrange  as  we 
do  those  of  matter  according  to  the  resemblances 
that  are  between  them.  A  law  of  material  nature 
is  but  the  expression  of  a  general  fact — so  that 
when  we  affirm  the  law  of  gravitation,  we  only 
affirm  of  every  piece  of  matter  subject  to  this  law, 
that  it  moves  towards  other  matter  at  a  distance 
from  itself.  And,  in  like  manner,  a  law  of  mental 
nature  is  also  the  expression  of  a  general  fact — 
such,  for  example,  as  that  which  has  been  termed 
the  law  of  association,  or  that  law  by  which  when 
any  two  objects  have  in  thought  been  present 
together  to  the  mind,  then  the  thought  of  the  one 
object  at  any  future  time  suggests  the  thought  of 
the  other  also.  It  is  thus  that  the  mind  is  the 
subject  of  certain  sequences,  just  as  matter  is. 
And  the  investigation  of  these  laws  or  sequences  is 
just  the  physical  investigation  of  the  mind,  or  of 
the  mind  considered  as  the  subject  of  phenomena 
that  follow  each  other  in  a  certain  order  of  succes¬ 
sion — even  as  we  currently  observe  such  an  order 
in  external  nature  around  us. 

5.  Now  in  the  prosecution  of  this  study  let  me 
try,  to  use  an  illustration  of  David  Hume’s,  let 
me  try  to  make  myself  acquainted  with  some  one 
of  the  mental  affections  as  anger;  and,  on  the 
moment  that  I  turn  my  eye  inwardly  for  that  pur¬ 
pose,  the  thing  which  I  am  in  quest  of  takes  flight 
and  disappears.  It  is  not  so  w'hen  I  examine  the 
properties  of  any  substance  in  Natural  History. 

I  can  direct  a  steady  gaze,  for  example,  on  the 
colours  of  any  plant  or  plumage  or  beautiful  insect 


62 


A  TECULIAR  DIFFICULTy  IN 


that  is  submitted  to  me — and  they  remain  steadily 
and  unchangingly  within  the  field  of  my  vision. 
They  stand  my  inspection — and  I,  looking  again 
and  again,  can  mark  and  register  all  the  varieties 
of  hue  or  of  shading  which  occur  in  the  various 
specimens  that  are  before  me.  It  is  so  with  the 
matters  of  external,  but  not  so  with  those  of 
internal  observation.  To  have  full  advantage  for 
ascertaining  the  nature  and  varieties  which  there 
are  in  the  feeling  of  resentment — one  would  like 
that  he  had  its  permanent  characteristics  inscribed, 
as  it  were,  on  the  walls  of  the  mental  chamber , 
and  that  he  might  repeatedly,  or  any  time  when 
at  leisure,  give  successive  acts  of  attention  to  this 
inner  tablet,  just  as  he  would  do  to  a  medal  or  a 
picture  or  a  piece  of  mineralogy.  But  truly  it  is 
not  in  this  way  that  the  mind  can  be  studied,  or 
that  the  nature  and  law  of  any  one  of  its  affections 
can  be  ascertained.  So  soon  as  the  eye  of  con¬ 
sciousness  can  be  turned  towards  them,  they  are 
supposed  to  evanish  before  it.  And  the  reason 
of  this  is,  that,  to  uphold  any  particular  affection, 
there  must  be  present  to  the  mind,  either  in  re¬ 
membrance  or  in  reality,  the  particular  thing  or 
object  which  excited  it.  One  ceases  to  be  angry, 
so  soon  as  he  ceases  to  think  of  the  provocation. 
Let  there  be  an  attempt  then,  on  the  part  of  the 
mind,  to  study  the  phenomena  of  anger — and  its 
attention  is  thereby  transferred  from  the  cause  of 
the  affection  to  the  affection  itself — and  so  soon  as 
its  thoughts  are  withdrawn  from  the  cause,  the 
affection,  as  if  deprived  of  its  needful  aliment,  dies 
away  from  the  field  of  observation.  There  might 


THE  STUDY  OF  MIND. 


63 


be  heat  and  indignancy  enough  in  the  spirit,  so 
long  as  it  broods  over  the  affront  by  which  they 
have  been  originated.  But  whenever  it  proposes, 
instead  of  looking  outwardly  at  the  injustice,  to 
look  inwardly  at  the  consequent  irritation,  it  in¬ 
stantly  becomes  cool — and  we  are  somewhat  in  the 
same  circumstances  of  disadvantage,  as  if  we 
wished  to  examine  the  flame  of  a  candle  of  which 
we  had  but  one  look,  but  were  not  permitted  to  look 
on,  till  it  were  dipped  in  a  vessel  of  mephitic  air,  by 
which  it  was  extinguished.  How  can  we  find  that 
which  is  dissipated  by  the  very  act  of  seeking  after 

it  ? _ or  which  glides  away  like  the  spectre  that  is 

seen  by  flits  and  momentary  glances,  but  recoils 
from  the  intense  and  steady  observation  of  human 
eyes  ?  A  thermometer  could  give  no  information 
to  him,  whose  eye  had  the  Medusa  property  of  con¬ 
gealing  all  that  it  looked  upon— insomuch  that  the 
mercury  instantly  and  at  all  times  fell  to  zero 
under  his  gaze.  And  it  is  somewhat  so  when  we 
try  to  ascertain,  what  may  be  called  the  moral 
temperature  of  any  feeling  or  emotion  within  us. 
The  mind  ceases  to  feel,  when  it  ceases  to  think 
of  that  which  caused  or  perpetuated  the  feeling. 
But  it  ceases  so  to  think — when  it  looks  inwardly 
upon  itself,  and  begins  to  analyze  its  own  pheno¬ 
mena  or  its  own  processes.  When  I  am  thinking 
of  my  anger,  I  am  not  thinking  of  the  man  who 
made  me  angry — and  the  more  that  I  concentrate 
my  thoughts  upon  the  one,  with  the  view  perhaps 
of  a  thorough  and  close  inspection  of  it — the  more 
do  I  abstract  my  regards  from  the  other.  And 
thus,  unlike  to  other  subjects  of  examination,  the 


64 


A  PECULIAR  DIFFICULTY  IN 


more  that  I  fix  my  attention  upon  its  lineaments, 
the  more  do  they  fade  away  from  my  observation 
— and  the  darkness  thickens,  as  it  w'ere,  with  every 
effort  that  is  made  of  intenser  discernment. 

6.  This  holds  true  not  merely  of  anger,  but  of 
all  the  other  emotions  whereof  the  mind  is  suscep¬ 
tible.  To  feel  hatred,  there  must  be  something 
present  to  the  mind’s  eye  that  is  hateful.  To  feel 
esteem,  there  must  be  something  present  to  the 
mind’s  eye  that  is  estimable.  To  feel  gratitude 
or  pity  or  moral  approbation  something  must  be 
within  notice,  and  be  noticed : — a  benefactor  must 
be  seen  or  thought  of — a  sentient  creature  in 
suffering  must  be  adverted  to — a  virtuous  person, 
or  a  virtuous  deed  must  have  the  eye  of  contem¬ 
plation  fastened  upon  it.  These  are  the  objects 
either  of  perception  or  of  memory,  at  the  time  of 
the  emotion  in  question ;  and  the  mind  is  the  sub¬ 
ject  of  the  emotion.  Now  it  is  in  turning  from 
the  object  to  the  subject,  that  the  emotion  vanishes. 
If  it  be  true  of  the  mind  that  it  can  only  think  of 
one  thing  at  a  time — then  it  cannot  at  the  same 
instant  look  with  intentness  on  that  which  is  lovely, 
and  reflect  with  intentness  on  the  love  that  is  felt 
for  it.  The  love  is  felt  when  it  is  not  reflected 
upon, — and  why  ?  because  the  mind  is  otherwise 
employed — even  in  gazing  on  that  which  is  lovely. 
And  again  when  it  is  reflected  upon  it  is  not  felt — 
and  why?  because  the  lovely  object  is  then  out  of 
view — the  mind  having  turned  away  from  it,  to 
look  at  the  impression  which  it  maketh  upon  itself 
But  then  the  impression  fades  into  evanescence, 
even  by  the  momentary  leave  which  tlie  mind  takes 


THE  STUDY  OF  MIND. 


65 


of  the  object— and  can  only  be  renewed  again  by 
another  visit  as  it  were,  by  an  act  of  recurrence 
that  shall  again  bring  the  mind  and  the  object  into 
contact.  It  is  when  the  eye  looks  openly  and 
directly  outward  on  external  nature — it  is  only 
then  that  the  whole  scene  of  contemplation  is 
pictured  forth  on  the  retina  behind.  But  should 
the  eye  attempt  to  see  this  picture ;  and,  in  turn¬ 
ing  round  upon  its  socket,  withdraw  the  pupil  fiom 
its  original  exposure  to  the  objects  that  weie  be¬ 
fore  it _ the  retina  would  instantly  be  darkened — 

and  all  that  was  looked  for  there  would  cease  to 
be.  And  thus  it  is,  with  every  attempt  to  explore 
the  recesses  of  the  mind.  Ihe  desire,  and  the 
aversion,  and  the  kindness,  and  the  blame,  and  the 
approval,  and  all  the  other  feelings  that  spring  up 
there,  do  so,  as  it  were,  at  the  touch  of  certain 
objects  of  which  the  mind  is  then  taking  cognizance 

_ and,  when  passing  from  the  objects,  it  proceeds 

to  take  cognizance  of  the  feelings  themselves,  they 
go  into  dissipation,  and  leave  a  blank  over  which 
the  eye  of  consciousness  wanders  and  seeks  in  vain 
to  be  satisfied. 

7.  It  is  this  fugitive  character  of  the  mental 
phenomena  which  attaches  a  difficulty  to  the  study 
of  them.  Were  the  mind  isolated  from  all  con¬ 
verse  with  that  which  is  without,  there  would  be 
no  phenomena — no  principles  to  make  up  a  Philo¬ 
sophy,  because  there  would  be  no  facts — and  it 
would  be  utterly  in  vain  to  look  to  the  mind  for 
its  elementary  conceptions  for  example  of  grandeur 
or  of  beauty,  when  they  had  never  been  called 
forth  by  its  communion  with  external  Nature.  It 


66 


A  PECULIAR  DIFFICULTY  IN 


is  when  the  eye  rests  on  some  scene  of  loveliness^ 
or  when,  by  an  act  of  memory,  a  secondary  reflec¬ 
tion  of  it  is  held  forth  to  the  eye  of  the  inner  man — 
it  is  then  that  the  mind  gives  to  it  the  responding 
homage  of  its  grateful  and  delighted  admiration. 
It  is  the  presence,  either  by  vision  or  by  remem¬ 
brance,  of  the  objects  of  taste,  which  gives  rise  to 
the  emotions  of  taste — and  when  the  mind  takes 
leave  of  the  objects  to  look  at  the  emotions,  then 
as  at  the  turning  of  a  mirror — the  whole  reflection 
hath  disappeared.  So  long  as  the  mind’s  gaze  is 
outwardly  from  itself — all  the  internal  principles  of 
taste  may  be  in  vivid  and  busy  operation — and 
the  rapt  enthusiast,  while  inhaling  the  utmost 
enjoyment  from  the  scene  that  lies  before  him, 
may  be  not  only  in  warmest  but  in  most  legitimate 
ecstacies — the  inner  tablet  of  his  heart  carrying 
upon  it  an  accurate  as  well  as  a  bright  exempli¬ 
fication  of  the  whole  philosophy  of  the  subject. 
But  when  he  turns  himself  round  to  look  at  that 
philosophy  and  to  expound  it — he  looks  upon  a 
tablet  that  is  blinded  and  bereft  of  all  its  characters. 
The  chamber  which  he  now  tries  to  explore  has 
become  a  camera  obscura,  whose  opening  has  just 
been  averted  from  the  light  of  day,  and  from  the 
irradiations  of  that  landscape  with  the  reflection 
of  whose  graces  and  whose  glories  it  had  been  so 
recently  illuminated. 

8.  But  hitherto  we  have  spoken  in  terms  of  the 
common  opinion,  as  if  the  phenomena  of  mind 
were  the  objects  of  immediate  perception  to  the 
faculty  of  consciousness.  Now  to  us  it  seems 
quite  clear  that  if  so,  the  study  of  these  pheno- 


THE  STUDY  01*  MIND. 


67 


mena  would  not  be  difficult  merely  but  altogether 
impracticable.  At  least  this  were  the  untailing 
consequence,  if  it  be  indeed  true,  that  the  mind 
can  only  think  of  one  thing  at  the  same  instant  of 
time.  If,  on  the  one  hand,  anger  must  be  felt  and 
present  to  the  mind,  ere  it  can  be  thought  of;  and, 
on  the  other,  it  cannot  be  felt  unless  its  provoca¬ 
tive  or  the  object  which  awakens  it  be  thought  of 
— then  either  must  the  mind  be  able  to  think  of 
two  things  at  once,  or  it  cannot  possibly  have  the 
thought  or  the  perception  of  anger  at  all.  Now 
w'e  get  quit  of  this  difficulty  by  adopting  Dr. 
Thomas  Brown’s  view  of  consciousness.  It  is 
not  that  faculty  by  which  we  become  sensible  of 
the  feelings  that  are  present  to  the  mind ;  but  that 
by  which  w’e  remember  the  feelings  that  have 
recently  passed  through  it.  The  act  of  conscious¬ 
ness,  to  make  use  of  his  own  expression,  is  a  brief 
act  of  the  memory.  In  the  study  of  anger  the 
mind  is  busied,  not  with  its  sensations  of  the 
present,  but  with  its  recollections  of  the  past.  It 
is  true  that  these  recollections  may  have  faded 
and  become  indistinct :  and  that  to  repair  this 
disadvantage,  the  mind  must  light  up  again  its 
feelings  of  resentment  by  recalling  some  object  of 
them ;  and  thus  may  have  the  benefit  of  a  more 
recent,  and  therefore,  of  a  more  vivid  recollection 
to  guide  and  to  inform  it — the  recollection  of  a 
few  moments  back,  instead  of  a  few  days  or  a  few 
weeks  in  its  past  history.  We  can  remember  the 
sensation  of  hunger  without  feeling  it ;  and,  in 
like  manner,  might  we  not  remember  the  emotion 
of  anger  without  feeling  it?  Or,  in  other  words, 


68 


A  PECULIAR  DIFFICULTY  IN 


Uie  various  states  and  susceptibilities  of  the  mind 
come  within  the  range  of  the  memory.  To  explore 
its  secrets  one  does  not  need  to  look  inwardly  into 
himself,  as  into  a  kind  of  magical  chest  that  is 
carried  about  at  rustic  fairs,  and  where  through 
an  aperture  we  are  made  to  behold  some  microcosm 
of  curious  and  varied  imagery.  It  is  not  thus 
that  we  obtain  our  acquaintance  with  the  feelings 
of  the  human  mind,  any  more  than  by  the  micro¬ 
scopic  examination  of  its  texture,  we  obtain 
acquaintance  with  the  various  susceptibilities  of 
the  human  skin.  It  is  first  through  the  medium 
of  experience,  and  then  through  our  recollections 
of  that  experience,  that  we  come  to  know  and 
learn  to  distinguish  the  varieties  either  of  physical 
or  of  mental  sensation.  By  memory  alone,  we 
can  make  distinction  between  the  pain  of  a  punc¬ 
ture,  and  of  a  lash,  and  of  a  bruise,  and  of  a  burn, 
and  of  a  heavy  and  obtuse  blow.  And  so  by 
memory  alone,  we  can  make  distinction  between 
the  emotions  of  the  mind — its  fear,  and  its  com¬ 
passion,  and  its  grief,  and  its  anger,  and  all  the 
other  feelings  of  which  it  is  susceptible. 

9.  The  one  view  of  consciousness  however  leads 
to  the  same  practical  conclusion  with  the  other, 
as  to  the  way  in  which  our  knowledge  of  the  mind 
is  to  be  acquired.  It  is  not  by  looking  to  the 
mind,  apart  and  in  a  state  of  disjunction  from  all 
that  is  without — but  by  looking  first  to  those 
objects  which  are  addressed  to  its  various  feelings 
and  faculties,  and  by  which  they  may  be  brought 
into  living  play ;  and  it  is  thus  that  the  mind  will 
announce  its  own  character  and  constitution  to 


THE  STUDY  OF  MIND. 


69 


the  conscious  owner  of  it.  We  must  not  think  to 
master  its  philosophy,  by  so  isolating  the  mind,  as 
to  put  it  into  a  state  of  inertness — for  all  the 
materials  of  this  Philosophy  are  gathered  from 
what  we  feel  and  from  what  we  remember  of  mind, 
when  put  into  a  state  of  activity.  It  is  doubtless 
true,  that  a  certain  freedom  from  the  glare  and 
the  disturbance  that  is  without,  is  essential  to  the 
business  of  the  understanding.  But  that  is  no 
reason  why  we  should  try  to  read  a  difficult  author 
in  the  dark — and  as  little  why,  for  the  sake  of  the 
silence  and  abstraction  that  might  be  thought  in¬ 
dispensable  to  the  study  of  mind,  we  should  close 
all  its  loopholes  of  communication  with  external 
Nature — for  this  would  in  fact  be  to  draw  a  screen 
over  the  characters  of  the  internal  tablet — this 
would  be  to  make  the  mind  itself  invisible. 

10.  We  are  persuaded  that  the  science  of  mind 
wears  an  air  of  far  more  hopeless  and  inaccessible 
mystery  than  rightfully  belongs  to  it.  All  the 
primary  phenomena  of  mind  are  of  mind  as  oper¬ 
ated  upon  by  objects  which  are  separate  from 
itself ;  and  the  direct  method  of  placing  these 
phenomena  distinctly  and  legibly  before  us,  is,  in 
the  first  instance  by  close  and  busy  converse  with 
these  objects.  When  we  want,  for  example,  to 
see  the  law  and  the  nature  of  that  mental  sensi¬ 
bility  which  is  denominated  compassion,  let  us  try 
the  vivid  conception  of  some  unhappy  sufferer,  let 
us  bethink  ourselves  of  some  malefactor  under  an 
agony  of  fearfulness,  because  of  his  approaching 
execution,  or  of  a  mother  exercised  by  deaths 
when  the  trying  hand  of  Providence  is  upon  her 


70 


A  PECULIAR  DIPFlCULTif  IN 


family — ^let  us  remember  how  we  felt  when  a  scene 
of  distress  was  actually  before  us ;  or,  by  a  briefer 
act  of  the  memory  still,  ascertain  how  we  feel  now, 
when  we  have  set  a  picture  of  distress  before  the 
eye  of  our  imagination.  It  is  only  by  keeping  up 
a  busy  interchange  between  the  world  of  sense 
and  the  world  of  spirit  that  the  mysteries  of  the 
latter  will  at  length  be  unravelled — not  by  descend¬ 
ing  empty  handed  to  the  cell  that  is  within,  but  by 
first  going  forth  on  the  peopled  region  of  life  and 
observation  that  is  without — and,  instead  of  form¬ 
ally  sitting  down  to  some  fruitless  and  fatiguing 
work  of  abstraction  with  nought  hut  vacancy  to 
gaze  upon,  we  shall  learn  and  almost  without  an 
effort  what  be  the  responses  from  the  one  to  the 
representations  which  are  offered  from  the  other. 
It  is  thus,  in  fact,  that  some  of  the  most  delicate 
and  important  of  our  moral  questions  may  be 
determined.  We  might  dive  among  the  recesses 
of  the  heart ;  and  there  rummage  in  vain  for  the 
principles  that  we  are  in  quest  of.  But  if,  instead 
of  this,  we  should  fasten  our  eye  on  some  moral 
exhibition  that  is  without  us ;  if  we  should  look,  for 
example,  to  the  man  who  at  the  shrine  of  justice 
made  some  generous  and  high-minded  sacrifice ; 
who,  though  in  the  hands  of  a  merciless  creditor, 
could  not  stoop  even  to  the  easiest  and  most  pardon¬ 
able  disguise,  though  it  were  to  save  his  children 
from  famishing;  hut,  who  spurning  at  the  distinction 
between  a  venial  and  an  atrocious  lie,  stood  forth 
in  the  perfect  simplicity  of  truth,  resolved  to  give 
up  all  and  to  suffer  all, — we  do  not  need  to  turn 
from  this  spectacle,  that  we  might  read  our  own 


THE  STUDY  OF  MIND. 


71 


hearts,  as  if  we  could  gather  from  an  inscription 
there — whether  truth  and  justice  be  virtues  of 
original  and  independent  rank,  or  utility  be  the 
only  substratum  that  they  rest  upon.  The  heart 
hath  already  issued  forth  its  unbidden  voice,  and 
already  hath  announced  the  homage  that  is  due 
to  the  virtues  which  we  are  contemplating — and  it 
is  thus  that  Moral  Philosophy  may  be  learned — it 
is  by  a  direct  survey  of  life  and  conduct  in  all  their 
variety  that  its  principles  may  be  determined. 

11.  Let  such  be  conceived  to  be  the  powers 
and  the  resources  of  our  language,  that  a  nomen¬ 
clature  could  be  found  for  a  hundred  of  those 
various  sensations  that  are  impressed  by  all  differ¬ 
ent  substances  on  the  human  palate.  Then  it  is 
not  by  the  anatomy  of  this  organ,  but  by  the 
application  of  it  to  each  of  these  substances,  and 
the  classification  of  all  the  resulting  tastes ;  many 
of  which,  instead  of  having  to  be  nicely  and  labo¬ 
riously  marked,  will  vividly  and  by  their  own  force 
announce  themselves  to  our  feeling — it  is  thus 
that  the  philosophy,  if  it  may  be  so  called,  of  this 
subject  will  be  completed.  And,  in  like  manner, 
it  is  not  by  an  anatomy  of  the  mind,  treated  apart, 
as  it  were,  from  the  objects  by  which  it  is  affected 
— it  is  not  by  the  application  of  a  dissecting  meta¬ 
physics,  wherewith  one  probes  and  penetrates  his 
way  among  the  vesicles  or  the  arcana  of  an  organ 
that  would  be  else  inscrutable,  that  the  phenomena 
of  our  moral  taste  or  moral  judgment  are  to  be 
verified  and  arranged,  and  reduced  to  the  genera] 
expressions  of  philosophy.  Bring  the  deed  or 
the  disposition,  either  by  report  or  by  actual  ex- 


A  PECULIAR  DIFFICULTY  IN 


V2 


hibition,  to  the  view  of  the  observer ;  and,  in 
most  instances,  the  voice  that  is  within  will 
promptly  and  powerfully  characterize  it.  The 
moral  judgment  will  come  unbidden ;  and,  when 
thus  brought  forth  of  the  hiding  place  in  which  it 
slumbered  inert  and  motionless  from  the  mere 
absence  of  that  appropriate  object  to  the  presence 
of  which  it  never  fails  to  respond — then  is  the 
time  at  which  it  may  be  seized  upon,  and  em¬ 
bodied  in  language,  and  have  a  name  and  a  local 
habitation  given  to  it  among  the  truths  of  philo¬ 
sophy — not  fetched  up  by  the  hand  that  groped 
for  it  through  the  latent  depositoides  of  the  mind — 
but,  like  the  electric  spark,  announcing  itself 
patently  and  in  the  face  of  day,  because  elicited 
by  the  affinity  that  there  is  between  the  action  that 
is  without  and  the  sentiment  that  is  within.  It 
is  thus  that  the  region,  not  of  the  Moral,  but 
even  of  the  Mental  Philosophy,  is  far  from  being 
that  land  of  shadows  or  impracticable  subtleties 
which  many  do  imagine — that  a  clear  experimental 
light  is  diffusible  over  it — and,  instead  of  so  many 
evanescent  abstractions  that  have  no  tenacious 
hold  upon  the  human  understanding  nor  admit  of 
being  familiarly  applied  to  the  homes  and  the 
business  of  humanity,  it  deals  in  such  feelings  as 
are  naturally  called  forth  by  such  phenomena  in 
the  life  and  in  the  affairs  of  men  as  are  actually 
exhibited.  ^ 

12.  We  are  not  sure  that  the  term  Physiology, 
recently  applied  to  Mental  Science,  has  not  in¬ 
vested  it  with  a  more  hopeless  obscurity  than  in 
truth  belonffs  to  it.  It  has  led  many  to  imagine 


THE  STUDY  OF  MIND. 


73 


a  work  of  dissection,  of  intense  and  internal 
scrutiny,  to  which  they  know  not  how  they  should 
address  themselves,  and  to  which  therefore  they 
feel  that  they  are  utterly  incompetent.  They 
conceive  of  the  term  as  applied  to  a  plant — where 
it  is  the  office  of  physiology  to  explore  all  those 
mysteries  of  secretion,  and  assimilation,  and 
growth,  and  other  equally  recondite  processes, 
which  go  on  within  the  recesses  of  its  organic 
structure.  And  it  is  thus  they  apprehend  that 
metaphysicians,  those  men  of  transcendental 
power,  whom  they  despair  to  follow,  can  probe 
their  way  through  the  inner  chambers  and  profun¬ 
dities  of  the  mind,  and  evolve  from  thence  the 
secrets  of  a  hidden  territory  which  is  to  them  in¬ 
scrutable.  In  studying  the  physiology  of  a  plant, 
we  look  to  the  plant  itself ;  and  to  it  we  direct  our 
eyes  and  our  microscopes  and  all  our  instruments  of 
observation.  And  it  is  indeed  a  most  natural  imagi¬ 
nation,  that,  as  of  one  physiology,  so  of  another. 
For  the  phenomena  of  mind,  and  the  right  classifica¬ 
tion  of  them,  whither  can  we  turn  ourselves  but  to 
the  place  which  is  the  seat  of  these  phenomena  ? 
What  else  can  we  do,  but  abstract  ourselves  from 
the  things  of  sight  and  of  sense,  and  look  inwardly? 
It  is  with  thoughts  and  feelings  and  fancies  that 
we  want  to  acquaint  ourselves;  and  what  other 
possible  way  is  there,  than  just  to  pore  over  the 
characters  of  that  mental  tablet  upon  which  all 
these  are  graven  ? — looking  to  a  plant,  when  we 
study  the  laws  of  vegetable  nature ;  but  also 
looking  to  a  man,  and  to  the  inner  man  too,  when 
we  study  the  laws  of  Moral  or  Intellectual  nature. 

VOL.  V. 


x> 


74 


A  PECULIAR  DIFFICULTY  IN 


13.  But  this  may  be  gone  about  in  such  a  way 
as  to  darken  the  whole  field  of  contemplation. 
The  laws  of  vision  can  only  be  studied  by  the  eye 
looking  to  visible  objects — and  not  by  the  eye 
looking  to  itself.  Even  the  physiology  of  a  plant 
is  learned,  by  our  looking  to  the  phenomena  that 
have  their  residence  in  the  plant  itself,  under  all 
varieties  of  exposure.  The  same  is  true  of  the 
mind — ^but  what  are  the  exposures  necessary,  for 
eliciting  its  phenomena  and  its  laws  ?  That  the 
mind  become  acquainted  with  itself,  it  must  go 
forth,  in  busy  and  active  exercise  on  objects  which 
are  separate  from  itself.  To  learn  the  phenomena 
of  thought,  it  must  be  provided  with  something  to 
think  about.  To  learn  the  phenomena  of  taste, 
there  must  be  offered  to  its  notice  that  which  it 
admires.  To  learn  the  phenomena  of  moral  feel¬ 
ing,  the  varieties  of  human  life  and  character  must 
be  submitted  to  its  contemplation — and  never  can 
it  know  the  philosophy  of  its  own  atfections,  with- 
-out  having  had  objects  of  desire,  and  hatred,  and 
esteem,  and  fear,  set  before  it.  In  a  word  it  is 
the  mind  that  is  most  practised  among  externals, 
which  is  most  crowyded  with  materials  for  the 
philosophy  of  its  internal  processes — and  we  again 
repeat  that  the  way  to  be  guided  through  the 
arcana  of  our  subject,  is,  not  to  descend  into  mind 
as  into  a  subterranean  vault  and  then  shut  the  door 
after  us — but  to  keep  open  communication  with  the 
light  of  day,  w'hich  can  only  be  done  by  a  perpetual 
interchange  of  notices  betw  een  the  w'orld  of  feelings 
that  is  within,  and  the  world  of  facts  and  of  illus¬ 
trations  and  of  familiar  experience  that  is  around  us. 


THE  STUDY  OF  MIND. 


75 


14.  It  might  lead  us  to  a  truer  conception  of 
the  way  in  which  the  mind  becomes  acquainted 
with  its  own  phenomena,  if  we  reflected  that  the 
mental  feelings  are  the  objects  of  remembrance, 
just  as  our  bodily  feelings  are.  And  if  so,  then, 
to  recollect  any  of  the  mental  emotions  such  as 
fear,  we  have  as  much  or  as  little  need  of  looking 
to  the  mind,  as,  to  recollect  the  pain  of  a  burn,  we 
need  look  to  the  skin ;  or,  to  recollect  the  taste  of 
an  apple,  we  need  look  to  the  palate.  To  remem¬ 
ber  the  sensations  aright,  it  is  not  necessary  that 
we  should  think  of  the  organs  of  sensation ;  or,  far 
less,  to  take  a  microscopic  survey  of  their  anatomy 
and  texture.  And  so,  to  remember  the  mental 
emotions  aright,  it  is  not  necessary  to  think  of  the 
mind;  and,  far  less,  to  deal  with  it  as  the  subject 
either  of  a  complex  anatomy  or  of  a  deep  and 
intricate  physiology.  All  that  is  known,  all  that 
can  be  known  of  the  mind,  is  the  various  states, 
whether  of  intellect  or  of  emotion,  into  which  it 
passes,  and  to  which  states  it  is  primarily  brought 
by  converse,  not  with  itself,  but  with  objects  apart 
from  itself.  Of  these  states  we  have  a  conscious¬ 
ness  at  the  first,  and  a  remembrance  afterwards, 
or  rather,  a  briefer  or  longer  remembrance  accord¬ 
ing  to  the  time  that  has  elapsed  from  the  moment 
of  our  undergoing  them.  According  to  this  view, 
it  is  memory  which  supplies  us  with  all  the  mate¬ 
rials  of  the  Mental  Philosophy ;  and  the  sole  office 
of  this  philosophy,  is  to  classify  the  states  which 
we  thus  remember  agreeably  to  their  resemblances, 
and  to  describe  the  circumstances  in  which  they 
arise. 


76 


A  PECULIAR  DIFFICULTY  IN 


15.  Whether  we  regard  then  the  mental  pneno- 
mena  as  objects  of  instant  perception  or  of  remem¬ 
brance,  as  it  is  mainly  by  converse  with  the 
external  world  that  they  come  into  being,  so  also, 
in  the  study  of  them,  must  we  often  recur  to  the 
objects  of  the  external  world,  that  they  might  start 
anew  into  existence,  and  be  again  presented  before 
the  eye  of  consciousness  or  of  memory.  There  is 
a  sense  in  which  it  may  be  said  of  every  science, 
that  all  its  principles  are  lodged  within  the  mind ; 
but,  in  studying  the  principles  of  Moral  Science, 
instead  of  going  in  search  of  them  within  and 
leaving  the  world  of  life  and  of  society  behind  us,  we 
should  rather  call  them  out  to  view,  by  the  pre¬ 
sentation  of  such  plain  historical  cases,  taken  from 
the  familiarity  of  human  affairs,  as  are  fitted  to 
excite  and  develop  them.  And,  besides,  it  is  not 
true,  that,  from  our  own  hearts  alone,  we  gather 
all  the  lineaments  and  characters  of  our  subject. 
We  read  them  in  the  countenance  of  our  fellow- 
men.  We  can  see  them  in  the  crimson  blush  of 
detected  and  exposed  villany.  Through  the 
medium,  not  of  articulate  language  only,  but  also 
of  the  natural  signs,  we  can  hear  what  morality  is, 
in  the  ready  and  indignant  disavowals  of  him,  who 
hath  been  injuriously  charged  with  some  deviation 
from  its  pure  and  rectilinear  path — and  on  those 
dread  occasions,  when  the  energy  of  the  public 
voice  falls  in  thunder  on  the  head  of  some  unhappy 
delinquent,  there  is  a  lightning  along  with  the  thun¬ 
der,  that  often  flashes  a  fearful  manifestation  on  the 
innermost  shrines  and  recesses  of  this  philosophy. 
And  should  we  be  guided  by  an  ascending  path, 


THE  STUDY  OF  MIND. 


77 


from  the  interests  and  the  moralities  of  this  earthly- 
scene,  to  view  the  righteousness  of  Him  who  sitteth 
on  high — then,  instead  of  having  to  probe  a  darkling 
way  among  the  penetralia  of  our  own  bosom,  the 
truth  will  emanate  directly  upon  us  from  that  gal¬ 
axy  of  moral  splendour  which  encircles  his  throne. 

16.  This  distinction  between  the  objective  and 
the  subjective  is  of  main  use  and  application  in 
Christianity.  Here,  if  any  where,  it  is  to  the 
objective  that  the  subjective  owes,  if  not  its  being, 
at  least  all  its  aliment.  There  must  be  a  contem¬ 
plation  of  truths  apart  from  the  mind  of  the  con- 
templator,  ere  the  mind  is  put  into  a  right  state, 
not  only  of  intellect,  but  of  emotion.  The  objec¬ 
tive  is  the  fountain-head  of  the  subjective.  It  is 
by  looking  outwardly  on  the  love  of  God  to  us, 
that  we  are  made  to  feel  inwardly  a  love  to  God 
back  again.  It  is  the  view  of  His  good  will  which 
awakens  our  gratitude;  of  His  greatness  which 
awes  and  solemnizes  us  into  deepest  reverence ;  of 
His  moral  perfections  which  calls  forth  our  love  of 
esteem  and  disinterested  admiration.  The  felt 
affection  in  these  and  all  other  instances,  as  being 
subjective,  is  in  the  mind;  but,  with  the  single 
exception  of  self-love,  its  bearings  are  towards  the 
objective,  or  to  something  that  is  out  of  the 
mind.  In  other  words,  the  mind  to  obtain  a 
right  state,  or  to  rectify  itself,  must  go  forth  of 
itself.  They  are  external  things  which  meet  the 
greater  part  of  its  internal  desires,  and  yield  to 
it  the  greater  part  of  its  internal  satisfactions. 
When  it  is  in  a  state  of  felt  want,  it  is  after  the 
objective  that  it  hungers  and  thirsts — when  in  a 


78 


A  PECULIAR  DIFFICULTY  IN 


state  of  complacent  fulness  and  gratification,  it  is 
by  the  objective  that  it  is  satisfied.  When  the 
soul  of  the  Psalmist  thirsted,  and  thirsted  vehe¬ 
mently,  it  was  after  the  living  God;  and  it  passed 
from  the  state  of  desire  to  the  state  of  attainment, 
when  made  glad  by  the  light  of  His  countenance. 
We  are  sensible  that  to  christianize  the  mind, 
something  more  than  an  objective  presentation  of 
the  truths  of  Christianity  is  indispensable.  There 
must  be  a  subjective  preparation  in  the  mind  itself. 
It  must  be  put  into  a  right  state  of  correspondence 
or  of  recipiency.  The  objects  without  the  counter¬ 
part  susceptibilities  are  of  no  avail.  It  is  not 
enough  that  the  seed  of  the  word  of  God  be  de¬ 
posited  in  the  heart :  The  heart  must  be  made 
a  good  and  honest  one,  for  the  entertainment  and 
development  of  its  truths.  It  is  not  enough  that 
living  water  be  made  to  descend  on  us  from  the 
upper  sanctuary  :  For  the  reception  of  this  water, 
a  well  must  be  struck  out  in  the  heart  of  regene¬ 
rated  man,  springing  up  unto  life  everlasting. 

17.  Still  with  every  admission  of  the  previous 
need  of  a  subjective  operation  upon  the  soul,  that 
it  may  be  put  into  a  right  state  of  susceptibility — 
changed,  to  use  a  scriptural  image,  from  a  heart 
of  stone  to  a  heart  of  flesh — with  every  admission 
of  the  necessity  for  such  a  renewal  on  the  subjec¬ 
tive  mind ;  still,  it  is  with  things  objective,  that, 
in  all  its  moral  and  spiritual  aspirations  towards  a 
better  state,  the  mind  has  properly  to  do.  To 
obtain  a  capacity  for  right  emotions,  all,  it  appears 
to  us,  which  we  can  do  is  to  pray  for  it.  But 
fully  to  realize  the  right  emotions  themselves,  we 


THE  STUDY  OF  MIND. 


7^ 


must  go  forth  on  their  counterpart  objects;  for 
without  the  meeting  of  these,  the  mere  susceptibility 
remains  latent  and  unknown  because  unevolved. 
It  is  by  the  application  of  a  kindling  from  without, 
that  we  test  the  ditference  between  the  combus¬ 
tible  and  the  incombustible ;  and  it  is  by  the  like 
application  of  a  truth  or  object  from  without,  that 
we  test  the  difference  between  a  soul  that  is 
quickened  and  a  soul  that  is  dead  in  trespasses 
and  sins.  The  teachers  of  Christianity  should 
give  themselves  wholly  to  prayer,  and  to  the 
ministry  of  the  word.  It  is  through  prayer,  that 
tlie  people  are  made  willing  in  the  day  of  God’s 
power — and  it  is  through  the  ministry  of  the  word, 
that  the  now  susceptible  will  is  evoked  into  actual 
volition,  and  the  new  man  is  prpmpted  to  new 
obedience.  It  is  by  a  subjective  operation  that 
the  heart  is  made  alive  to  every  good  impulse ;  It 
is  by  the  objective  that  the  impulse  is  g^/^e.  It 
is  by  the  subjective  that  the  mind,  bef're  inert 
and  immoveable,  becomes  capable  of  being  moved; 
But  the  moving  force  comes  from  the  objective; 
and  the  great  office  or  design  of  preaching  is  to 
bring  this  force  to  bear  upon  the  people.  Doubt¬ 
less  they  must  look  to  themselves,  as  well  as  to 
the  law,  that  they  may  have  the  conviction  of  sin. 
But  still  it  is  the  majesty  of  the  law  which  solem¬ 
nizes  them.  It  is  the  view  of  the  Lawgiver  seated 
on  His  august  and  inviolable  throne  which  overawes 
them.  They  are  the  threatenings,  the  dread 
penalties  of  a  fixed  and  uncompromising  law, 
which  fill  them  with  the  apprehension,  that  if  they 
have  only  the  law  to  deal  with  they  are  undone. 


80 


A  PECULIAR  DIFFICULTY  IW 


Thus  far  it  is  with  the  objective  mainly  that  we 
have  to  do ;  and  it  is  with  the  objective  altogethevy 
when  we  pass  from  the  ministry  of  wrath  to  the 
ministry  of  reconciliation ;  when  we  bid  the  now 
agonized  sinner  look  to  the  Saviour  on  the  cross^ 
to  the  spectacle  of  God  so  loving  the  world  as  to> 
lay  on  His  own  Son  the  burden  of  the  world’s  pro¬ 
pitiation.  It  is  then  that  the  objective  has  all 
the  achievement  and  all  the  triumph — it  being  the 
exhibition  of  right  objects  which  gives  rise  to  the 
excitement  of  right  affections.  The  mind  is  plied 
with  calls  and  overtures  from  without ;  and  it  is  in 
the  act  of  looking  away  from  itself,  not  downwardly 
amongst  the  mysterious  recesses  of  its  own  con¬ 
stitution,  but  upwardly  to  a  beseeching  God  and 
an  all-sufficient  Saviour,  that  it  passes  from  a  state 
of  turbulence  and  terror  into  the  harmonies  of  its 
own  new  creation,  into  a  state  of  peace,  and  love,, 
and  joy. 

18.  It  were  well  that  we  proceeded  more  on 
th^  power  and  precedency  of  the  objective,  in  the 
work  of  Christianization — that,  instead  of  the 
fatigue  and  the  fruitlessness  of  those  efforts,  by 
which  we  vainly  attempt  to  grope  a  way  among 
the  intricacies  or  the  hiding-places  of  our  own 
spirit,  we  opened  this  dreary  prison-house  to  the 
light  of  day — the  light  of  that  outward  manifesta¬ 
tion  which  beams  upon  us  so  gloriously  from 
heaven.  It  is  not  by  its  own  reflex  view  upon  itself, 
that  the  radiations  of  beauty  are  made  to  descend 
upon  the  sovd ;  but  by  looking  directly  forth  on 
the  smiling  landscape  that  is  before  it.  And  in 
like  manner,  it  is  not  by  a  darkling  plunge,  as  it 


THE  STUDY  OF  MIND. 


81 


were,  among  the  mysteries  and  the  metaphysics  of 
his  own  mental  constitution,  that  man  will  awaken 
any  good  affection  within  its  receptacles.  It  is  by 
external  converse  with  the  objects  that  are  fitted 
to  awaken  them.  It  is  a  wretched  spiritual  guid¬ 
ance  for  the  perplexed  and  labouring  inquirer, 
when  sent  to  search  and  scrutinize  among  the 
secrecies  of  his  own  dark  and  distempered  bosom. 
This  is  the  worst  initial  direction  that  can  possibly 
be  given  to  him.  Many  are  the  times  and  seasons 
of  his  spiritual  history,  in  which  it  may  be  said,  that, 
when  looking  to  himself,  he  is  looking  the  wrong 
way.  This,  at  least,  is  not  the  attitude,  in  which 
any  affection  for  God  or  for  goodness  can  ever  be 
awakened.  To  stir  up  wdthin  him  the  love  of 
God,  he  must  look  without  him  to  the  manifested 
loveliness  of  the  Godhead — the  graces  and  glories 
of  the  divine  character.  To  establish  within 
him  a  right  faith,  he  must  look,  not  within  him,  to 
the  act  of  faith ;  but  openly  and  outwardly  to 
Christ,  the  object  of  faith.  The  comfort  and 
the  confidence  do  not  spring  from  beneath ;  but 
come  down  in  floods  of  descending  light  from  the 
upper  sanctuary.  It  is  by  a  radiance  from  with¬ 
out,  that  the  distrust  and  darkness  of  Nature  are 
dissipated ;  and  when  the  spirit,  finding  no  remedy 
within  itself,  would  sink  into  despair,  it  is  the 
voice  from  without  which  reassures  it — of  one  who 
calls  on  the  weary  and  the  heavy  laden  to  come 
unto  Him  that  they  may  have  rest. 

19.  And  as  it  is  by  casting  an  objective  regard  on 
things  which  are  without,  that  we  call  forth  the 
emotions  of  the  mind — so  it  is  only  thus,  that  we 

D  2 


82 


A  PECULIAR  DIFFICULTY  IN 


can  possibly  ascertain  them.  Whatever  the  sus¬ 
ceptibilities  of  the  inner  man  may  be,  it  is  only  at 
the  touch  of  that  which. is  external  to  him  that 
they  are  fully  awakened,  or  at  least  so  awakened 
as  that  we  can  take  sure  and  satisfactory  account 
of  them.  When  there  are  strong  susceptibilities 
without  any  counterpart  objects  to  meet  them, 
we  can  imagine  a  state  of  embryo  desire — of 
strange  indefinable  restlessness — of  felt  and  tor¬ 
menting  vacancy — the  general  unsated  thirst  of  a 
spirit  that  is  the  prey  of  its  own  incessant  longings, 
for  which  it  finds  not  and  knows  not  the  means  of 
gratification.  We  can  imagine  a  hell  in  the  heart 
— when  fired  with  strong  propensities,  yet  pent  up 
within  itself,  and  so  dissevered  from  all  the  objects 
of  them;  or,  if  with  the  capacities  of  enjoyment, 
it  were  cast  on  open  space,  yet  empty  of  all  that 
was  adapted  to  these  capacities,  or  that  could 
minister  to  their  enjoyment.  We  know  not  what 
cognizance  could  be  taken,  or  what  analysis 
could  be  performed,  on  the  affections  of  a  mind  in 
this  strange  condition  of  hopeless  and  insupporta¬ 
ble  vacuity.  But  let  these  affections  have  objects 
to  go  forth  upon — then,  whether  it  is  the  desire 
which  suggests  the  thought  of  them,  or  the  view 
of  them  when  present  and  the  thought  of  them 
when  absent  which  suggests  the  desire — it  is  at 
least  a  distinct  and  definite  desire,  leading  to  a  dis¬ 
tinct  and  definite  pursuit ;  and,  if  not  disappointed, 
terminating  in  the  full  complacency  of  a  distinct 
and  definite  gratification.  They  are  these  busy 
reciprocations  of  thought  and  feeling — these  vivid 
interchanges  between  the  objective  and  the  ^  u 


THE  STUDY  OF  MIND, 


jective  which  supply  the  best  materials  for  the 
philosophy  of  human  nature ;  and,  above  all,  for 
the  knowledge  of  ourselves.  We  hear  frequent 
complaints  of  the  difficulty  of  self-examination. 
We  think  there  is  an  aggravated  and  mistaken 
sense  of  its  difficulty,  grounded  on  a  fiequent 
misconception  of  the  nature  and  objects  of  this 
exercise — as  if  it  were  to  ascertain  the  present 
state  of  the  mind  by  the  eye  of  consciousness, 
Kow,  instead  of  this,  the  practical  and  philosophi¬ 
cal  object  of  self-examination  is  to  ascertain  the 
past  states  of  the  mind  by  the  eye  of  memory. 
Still,  even  in  this  view,  there  might  be  an  arduous 
difficulty  in  the  way  of  self-examination— the  diffi- 
cultv  of  remembering  that  which  is  dim  or  faint 
or  indistinct ;  and,  still  more,  the  useless  fatigue  of 
trying  to  lay  hold  of  things  by  the  memory,  when 
there  is  nothing  to  remember.  The  more  deep 
and  discernible  those  lineaments  are,  which  are 
graven  on  the  tablet  of  memory,  the  easier  is  the 
work  of  self-examination.  The  more  strovgly 
felt  at  any  time  is  our  love  of  God,  or  our  grati¬ 
tude  to  the  Saviour,  or  our  compassion  to  a  suffer¬ 
er  in  distress,  or  our  ardent  desires  after  useful- 
ness  'then  it  is  that  these  affections  become  all 
the  more  noticeable,  because  the  more  brightly 
they  glow  within  us  at  the  moment,  the  more 
brightly  are  they  seen  in  the  retrospect  afterwards. 
And  if  the  question  be  put,  how  is  it,  in  order  to 
facilitate  the  work  of  self-examination,  how  is  it 
that  we  can  make  the  affections  we  are  in  quest 
of  to  he  more  strongly  felt  and  so  more  vividly 
remembered? — the  answer  seems  obvious — ^by 


84  A  PECULIAR  DIFFICULTY  IN 

repeating  more  frequently  and  entering  mort? 
closely  into  converse  with  the  objects  which 
awaken  them,  just  as  the  more  intensely  we  gaze 
on  s5me  fascinating  landscape,  not  only  the  deeper 
is  our  own  felt  ecstasy,  but  the  more  distinct  as 
well  as  more  enduring  must  be  our  recollection  of 
it.  In  a  word,  if  we  would  create  the  materials 
of  self-examination,  or  facilitate  its  work  by  cast¬ 
ing  a  greater  light  over  that  mental  tablet  which 
we  want  to  decipher — it  is  not  by  isolating  the 
mind  and  putting  it  into  a  state  of  inertness,  but 
by  bringing  it  into  contact  with  the  objects  of  its 
various  susceptibilities,  for  the  development  and 
discovery  of  the  aifections  which  really  belong  to 
it.  Or,  to  express  it  otherwise,  the  mind  that  is 
most  busied  among  externals,  presents  us  with 
the  richest  variety  of  internal  feelings  and  inter¬ 
nal  processes.  We  must  not  be  misapprehended 
as  if  we  meant  only  the  externals  of  the  material 
world,  or  even  of  the  world  of  living  society. 
The  great  objects  of  the  Christian  faith  are  all 
external  to  the  mind  that  is  exercised  by  them ; 
and  the  man  whose  attention  is  most  given  to 
these  through  the  day,  who  thinks  most  constantly 
of  God,  and  sends  up  the  most  frequent  aspira¬ 
tions  to  that  Saviour  who  died  for  him — let  us 
only  suppose  his  views  to  be  enlightened,  and  that 
he  is  engaged  through  the  hours  of  his  waking 
existence,  not  with  the  illusions  of  his  own  fancy, 
but  with  the  realities  of  our  actual  revelation — 
then,  precisely  because  most  employed  in  objec¬ 
tive  contemplation,  will  it  be  found  of  him,  that 
his  diurnal  retrospect  or  subjective  examination  of 


THE  STUDY  OF  MIND. 


85 


hiTflself  is  botli  tliG  richust  of  all  and  th©  easiest  ot 
all ;  and  if  it  be  the  habit  of  his  well  ordered  life,  that, 
ere  he  sinks  into  his  nightly  repose,  he  looks  back 
on  the  history  of  his  own  spirit— then,  in  very  pro¬ 
portion  to  his  past  converse  with  the  objects  of 
sacredness,  will  be  his  present  consciousness  or 
present  recollection  of  the  feelings  of  sacredness. 


CHAPTER  III.  ’ 

On  the  Emotions. 

1,  There  are  many  objects  of  human  thought, 
of  which  w’e  have  a  thorough  apprehension  on  the 
moment  of  their  being  named — but  which  it  is  im¬ 
possible  to  express  by  any  verbal  definition.  This 
eminently  applies  to  a  very  great  number  of  our 
feelings,  which  really  cannot  be  defined;  but 
which  may  be  adequately  enough  described  to  the 
understanding  of  others,  by  a  statement  of  the 
circumstances  in  which  they  arise.  How  for  exam¬ 
ple,  could  we  define  a  sensation  familiar  enough  to 
all— that  of  thirst?  Nor  is  it  necessary;  for  we 
are  already  anticipated  in  our  attempts  by  an  under¬ 
standing  of  it  on  the  part  of  all,  far  more  perfect 
than  any  which  mere  words  can  convey.  Nor 
could  we,  though  we  would,  furnish  any  well  con¬ 
structed  definition  of  it — however  practicable  it 
may  be  to  convey  its  full  meaning  to  the  mind  of 
another,  by  simply  stating  what  that  is  which 
brings  on  this  peculiar  and  uneasy  sensation,  and 


86 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


what  that  is  which  relieves  it.  It  is  thus,  in 
fact,  that  we  should  proceed  in  our  attempts  to 
explain  the  term  to  a  foreigner.  We  might 
point  to  its  seat  in  our  frame.  We  might  make 
intelligible  to  him  how  it  is  that  which  is  caused 
by  the  privation  of  water,  and  that  which  is 
allayed  either  by  this  or  by  some  other  bev¬ 
erage.  He  would  very  soon  catch  the  mean¬ 
ing  that  we  laboured  to  impress  upon  him — 
after  which  there  would  be  a  most  entire  com¬ 
munity  of  understanding  between  us,  at  least 
upon  this  subject.  He  would  no  more  confound 
it  with  hunger  or  any  other  of  our  sensations, 
than  he  would  confound  a  square  with  a  circle — 
and  the  distinctive  character  of  this  one  sensation 
would  be  as  fully  imprest  upon  him,  as  if  it  could 
have  been  enunciated  in  language  as  precise  as 
that  of  geometry. 

2.  We  cannot  define  what  is  meant  by  sound, 
but  by  the  help  of  some  other  equivalent  term  as 
noise — nor  could  w^e  define  a  noise,  but  by  the 
help  of  the  term  sound.  It  is  thus  that  when  we 
arrive  at  the  ne  plus  ultra  of  definitions,  and  still 
unwilling  to  quit  the  forms  of  science,  we  may 
think  that  we  are  making  progress,  when,  in  fact,  we 
are  only  bandied  from  one  place  to  another ;  and, 
after  a  thousand  reciprocations  of  this  sort,  find 
that  we  are  but  playing  upon  a  margin  beyond 
which  we  can  make  no  progress  whatever.  It  is 
certainly  possible  to  keep  up  a  ridiculous  gravity 
of  explanation,  long  after  it  has  ceased  to  be 
useful.  We  all  know  for  example  what  is  meant 
by,  corporeally  speaking,  the  sensation  of  taste — 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


87 


yet  that  need  not  prevent  us  from  telling  in  aca¬ 
demic  phrase,  that  it  is  a  peculiar  sensation  im¬ 
prest  on  the  tongue  and  palate,  on  theii  coming 
into  contact  with  any  material  substance.  This 
is  not  telling  what  the  sensation  is— it  is  only 
telling  what  we  know  already,  that,  in  order  to 
ascertain  the  taste  of  any  given  thing,  the  mouth 
is  the  place  to  which  we  must  carry  it.  And 
after  we  have  done  this,  how  soon  do  the  resources 
of  language  fail,  even  in  attempting  to  name,  and 
far  more  to  define  the  innumerable  varieties  of 
sensation  which  are  experienced  there.  Sweet¬ 
ness,  bitterness,  sourness,  saltness,  are  but  the 
genera  of  so  many  tastes,  early  comprehending  a 
vast  subordinate  family ;  and  altogether  of  as 
many  individuals  as  there  are  distinct  substances 
in  nature.  Now  we  cannot  define  sweetness, 
though  we  all  understand  it;  and  if  we  are  to 
attempt  a  conveyance  by  language  at  all  upon  the 
subject,  there  is  nothing  more  which  we  can  do 
than  simply  state  the  circumstances  in  which  this 
and  other  tastes  do  arise.  We  may  point  to  the 
sugar  which  impresses  the  peculiar  quality  of 
sweetness  upon  the  organ  of  taste,  or  to  the 
vinegar  which  impresses  sourness,  or  to  the  alkali 
which  is  bitter — and  so  trust,  for  a  common  under¬ 
standing,  to  an  experience  and  recollection  on  the 
part  of  others,  which  we  believe  to  have  been 
similar  to  our  own,  because  of  the  faith  that  we 
place  in  the  identity  of  our  common  nature. 

3.  Now  these  remarks  apply  to  other  impressions, 
as  well  as  to  the  impressions  that  are  made  upon 
the  senses.  We  may  describe  them  so  as  to  make 


88 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


others  understand  what  they  be  which  we  mean ; 
but  we  can  give  no  definition  of  them  to  any  pur¬ 
pose  for  which  definition  is  at  all  useful.  Our 
object,  at  present,  is  to  set  forth  a  few  generalities 
of  observation  on  a  class  of  mental  phenomena, 
which  have  been  called  emotions — and  which 
occupy  a  kind  of  middle  department  in  our  nature, 
between  the  merely  sensitive  and  the  purely  in¬ 
tellectual.  They  differ  from  each  of  these,  and 
by  certain  characteristics  which  admit  of  being 
enumerated.  They  differ  from  thirst  and  hunger 
and  corporeal  pain,  in  that  they  do  not  take  their 
rise  from  the  body.  They  differ  from  the  exter¬ 
nal  affections  too,  in  that  they  are  not  generally 
the  immediate  and  direct  consequence  of  the  pre¬ 
sence  of  external  objects — as  the  glare  of  light  by 
which  the  eyes  are  affected  in  presence  of  a  candle, 
or  the  noise  wherewith  the  ears  are  astounded  on 
the  report  of  fire-arms.  We  should  not  apply  the 
term  emotion  to  any  physical  taste  of  the  sweet  or 
the  bitter,  or  to  any  sense  of  fragrance  however 
delicious,  or  to  any  perception  of  melody,  unless 
in  so  far  as  it  was  the  vehicle  of  some  remembrance 
or  sentiment  that  was  fitted  to  call  forth  the 
emotions.  And  neither  should  we  apply  the  term 
to  any  intellectual  state  of  the  mind.  We  are 
quite  aware  of  the  difference  between  the  two 
states  of  mind,  in  one  of  which  it  is* that  we  re¬ 
member,  and  in  another  of  which  it  is  that  we 
love — between  the  state  in  which  we  judge  of 
truth,  and  the  state  in  which  we  desire  that  which 
is  agreeable,  or  hate  and  fear  that  which  is  revolt¬ 
ing — between  that  state  of  mind  in  wdiich  we  are 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


89 


when  we  simply  reject  as  untrue  the  proposition 
that  we  hold  to  be  false,  and  the  state  of  mind  in 
which  we  are  when  we  resent  as  culpable  that 
which  we  hold  to  be  injurious.  There  is  no 
danger,  we  should  imagine,  of  confounding  our 
emotions  with  either  our  sensitive  impressions  or 
our  intellectual  states — even  though,  at  the  same 
instant,  they  often  happen  to  be  blended  into  one 
complex  result,  and  to  work  a  general  and  con¬ 
temporaneous  effect  on  the  individual  who  is  the 
subject  of  them.  For  instance  a  fellow-man  might 
make  his  appearance  ;  and,  by  addressing  himself 
as  a  visible  object  to  the  eye,  there  is  an  impres¬ 
sion  made  upon  the  senses ;  and  he  may  be  re¬ 
membered  in  some  by-gone  passage  of  his  history, 
and  thus  be  the  object  of  memory,  one  of  the 
faculties  of  our  intellectual  nature — but,  in  the 
passage  so  remembered,  he  may  have  made  dis¬ 
covery  of  himself  as  the  deep  and  artful  enemy 
who  had  plotted  the  overthrow  of  our  fortunes; 
and  thus  the  quickly  felt  emotion  of  hatred  or 
indignancy  may  spring  up  within  us,  on  the 
moment  of  his  coming  within  the  field  of  our  vision. 
The  emotion  comes  immediately  from  the  presence 
of  an  external  object,  but  not  directly.  It  is  not 
the  object  regarded  simply  as  visible  that  has 
awakened  the  emotion,  but  the  object  as  associated 
with  the  remembrance  of  some  atrocious  villany. 
Still  however  blended  as  all  these  things  are 
together  in  this  and  many  other  instances  besides, 
there  is  no  danger  of  confounding  those  mental 
feelings  of  a  peculiarly  vivid  character,  which,  as 
mental,  are  distinguished  from  the  merely  sensi- 


90 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


tive  affections ;  and  as  vivid,  are  distinguishable 
from  the  calm  processes  of  judgment  or  memory  - 
— there  is  no  danger  of  confounding  those  which 
we  call  emotions,  with  either  the  one  or  the  other 
of  them  ;  insomuch  that  joy,  and  grief,  and  desire, 
and  astonishment,  and  respect,  and  contempt  and 
the  moral  sensibilities  whether  to  right  or  to  wrong, 
stand  most  noticeably  out  in  a  separate  depart¬ 
ment  of  their  own,  and  occupy  a  distinct  place 
from  the  other  departments  of  our  nature. 

4.  Now,  in  like  manner  as  in  the  impotency  of 
mere  definition,  we  must  do  the  best  we  can  to 
distinguish  the  emotions  of  the  mind  from  the 
other  classes  of  its  phenomena — so  we  must  just 
try  in  the  same  way  to  distinguish  the  emotions 
from  each  other,  as  fear  from  love,  contempt  from 
hatred,  remorse  from  admiration.  Either  a  com¬ 
mon  understanding  of  each  of  these  terms  may  be 
presumed  and  proceeded  upon;  or,  failing  this, 
we  know  of  no  other  way  by  which  the  emotions 
are  to  be  made  intelligible  to  others,  than  by  a 
statement  of  the  circumstances  under  which  they 
are  felt.  Were  we  to  attempt  a  definition  of  fear,  we 
might  avail  ourselves  of  the  words  terror  and 
apprehension ;  or  of  grief,  we  might  recur  to 
sadness ;  or  of  anger,  to  resentment ;  or  of  com¬ 
passion,  to  pity.  There  in  fact  can  no  effective 
definition  be  given,  because  none  that  can  more 
perspicuously  express  the  matter  to  be  explained, 
than  the  one  simple  term  familiarly  applied  to  it. 

5.  Emotion  is  blended,  not  merely  with  the 
perceptions  of  sense,  but  with  the  most  abstract 
and  lofty  exercises  of  the  understanding.  There 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


91 


is  a  delight  in  the  mere  gratifications  of  sense, 
which  we  share  in  common  with  the  inferior  ani¬ 
mals.  But  every  delight  that  is  separate  from 
these,  hangs  altogether  upon  the  emotions  of  the 
mind — and  if  we  have  ever  been  conscious  of  such 
delight,  while  prosecuting  the  calm  investigation 
of  truth,  we  shall  the  more  readily  believe  that, 
even  in  the  walk  of  purest  and  severest  intellect, 
the  mind  does  not  make  her  escape  from  the  sus¬ 
ceptibilities  of  emotion.  When  we  look  with  de¬ 
light  on  the  beauties  of  a  landscape,  the  mind  is 
under  the  infiuence  of  emotion — an  emotion  of 
taste.  But  there  is  such  a  thing  as  the  beauty  of 
a  theorem,  as  well  as  the  beauty  of  a  landscape — 
a  beauty  that  is  felt  in  the  mere  doctrine,  so  soon 
as  the  perception  of  its  evidence  dawns  upon  the 
understanding.  It  is  thus  that  emotion,  and  of 
the  most  truly  delicious  kind  too,  is  the  accom¬ 
paniment  even  of  the  severest  and  most  abstract 
exercises  of  thought ;  and  for  this  we  have  only  to 
appeal  to  those  who  have  felt  the  ravishment  which 
there  often  is  in  the  demonstrations  of  geometry — 
not  the  riotous  turbulence  of  pleasure,  but  its 
serene  and  deep  and  ethereal  ecstasy — that  which 
sheds  a  glory  over  the  student’s  enraptured  hour 
that  is  unknown  to  the  world,  and  which  almost 
consecrates  the  high  though  hidden  walk  of  his 
solitary  labours.  We  once  heard  Professor  Robison 
of  Edinburgh  say  that  he  saw  Bernoulli,  one  of 
the  greatest  mathematicians  of  the  continent  upon 
his  deathbed  ;  and  that  he  told  the  Professor  of 
his  never  having  had  a  more  perfect  conception  of 
the  happiness  of  heaven,  than  when  visited  with 


92 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


the  rapture  that  came  over  his  spirit,  as  he  followed 
Sir  Isaac  Newton  in  some  of  his  great  steps.  We 
fear  that  his  conception  of  heaven  was  indeed  very 
imperfect ;  and  that  he  adverted  not  to  the  happi¬ 
ness  which  is  current  there,  as  mainly  depending 
on  another  and  far  higher  order  of  emotions,  than 
even  those  of  towering  and  successful  intellect. 
Certain  it  is,  however,  that  intellect  hath  its  appen¬ 
dant  and  most  exquisite  gratifications — and  that, 
because  of  the  emotion  whether  of  delight  or  of 
wonder  which  is  felt  when  some  fresh  beauties  of 
speculation  are  disclosed,  or  some  new  and  noble 
discovery  pours  its  flood  of  splendour  into  the 
understanding. 

6.  We  have  no  doubt  that  the  term  emotion 
was  originally  applied  to  certain  of  the  mental 
affections,  just  because  of  their  tendency  to  move 
and  to  agitate  our  external  frame-work — such  as 
the  emotion  that  comes  from  our  sense  of  the  ridi¬ 
culous,  and  which  sets  us  a  laughing;  and  the 
emotion  of  fear,  which  may  set  us  a  trembling; 
and  the  emotion  of  anger,  which  may  set  us 
through  the  medium  of  hands,  and  eyes,  and  coun¬ 
tenance,  and  the  whole  bodily  attitude,  on  the 
fiercest  demonstrations  of  menace.  And  even  when 
there  is  not  much  of  positive  movement,  still  the 
term  emotion  is  applicable — as  in  the  case  of  the 
raptured  enthusiast ;  when  he  looks  abroad  either 
on  the  glories  of  nature,  or  to  some  piece  of  ex¬ 
quisite  workmanship  in  one  of  the  repositories  of 
art.  The  very  force  of  the  consequent  emotion, 
might  lay  such  an  arrest,  as  it  were,  upon  him,  as 
in  a  manner  to  compel  an  immoveable  stillness ; 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


•  93 


aiid  yet  we  should  say  that  emotion  was  pictured 
forth,  both  in  his  attitude  and  in  his  countenance. 
Whatever  in  fact  one  can  with  propriety  be  said 
mentally  to  feel,  is  an  emotion;  and  the  accom¬ 
panying  expression  of  it  by  a  movement  on  the 
part  of  the  body,  though  a  very  frequent,  is  not  a 
constant  or  indispensable  character  of  this  class  of 
phenomena.  We  may  be  said  to  feel  pain,  or  to 
feel  hunger ;  but  neither  of  these  is  an  emotion, 
because  they  take  their  rise  from  the  body.  It 
were  an  impropriety  of  language,  on  the  other 
hand,  to  say  that  we  feel  a  belief,  that  we  feel  a 
recollection,  that  we  feel  a  judgment;  for  though 
these  be  not  bodily  but  mental,  yet  in  themselves 
they  are  so  many  dispassionate  exercises  that  have 
nought  of  that  peculiar  force  or  vivacity  in  them, 
that  would  entitle  them  to  the  appellation  of  feel¬ 
ings.  Still  however,  though  a  merelj^  intellectual 
state  of  the  mind  is  not  in  itself  a  state  of  emotion, 
there  are  very  vivid  emotions  associated  even  with 
the  most  abstract  of  our  intellectual  processes. 
We  do  not  feel  the  belief  of  a  truth;  but  we  may 
feel  the  beauty  of  a  truth;  and  this  feeling  is  an 
emotion.  Every  species  of  mental  delight,  or  of 
mental  suffering,  comes  from  emotion.  We  do  not 
feel  the  conviction  of  any  doctrine;  but  we  may  feel 
its  importance.  We  may  be  thrown  into  a  state  of 
emotion  by  the  contemplation  of  its  usefulness,  of  the 
might  and  magnitude  of  its  bearings,  of  the  vast  sub¬ 
ordinate  family  of  other  truths  which  cluster  around 
it,  or  of  its  numerous  applications  to  the  good  of 
I'uman  society.  The  pleasure  that  we  have  in  the 
very  success  of  our  exercised  faculties,  even  though 


94- 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


these  faculties  be  purely  of  the  understanding,  this 
pleasure  is  both  in  itself  a  distinct  thing,  and  is  an 
emotion.  In  short,  apart  from  the  grosser  de¬ 
lights  of  sense  and  appetite,  there  would  be  no 
such  thing  as  enjoyment  of  any  sort  without  emo¬ 
tion. 

7.  We  cannot  conceive  of  happiness  apart  from 
emotion.  It  may  be  calm  yet  intense.  It  may 
not  effervesce  into  any  outward  or  visible  expres¬ 
sion  at  all,  yet  be  deeply  felt  within  the  recesses 
of  the  mind.  In  this  respect  there  seems  a  differ¬ 
ence  between  the  emotions — some  of  them  being 
confined  to  the  inner  chamber  of  the  soul;  yet 
ministering  there  a  joy  wherewith  a  stranger  cannot 
intermeddle,  or  a  bitterness  that  is  unrevealed  to 
others,  and  which  only  the  unhappy  possessor  him¬ 
self  knoweth  to  be  his  own.  Others  of  them  again 
break  forth  into  open  and  outrageous  ebullition,  as 
in  grief,  an  emotion  that  may  either  sink  down 
upon  the  heart  and  there  eat  inwardly,  or  vent  forth 
its  sufferings  in  full  and  audible  proclamation; 
and  in  resentment,  which  might  either  brood  in 
silence  over  its  dark  and  vindictive  purposes,  or 
wreak  its  fury  by  loud  reproach  and  instant  retalia¬ 
tion.  We  advert  to  this  distinction,  that  we  may 
not  imagine  an  absence  of  emotion,  w^hen  there  is 
apparent  tranquillity ;  or  think  that  the  soul  is 
unmoved,  because  it  hath  not  communicated  a 
sensible  impulse  to  the  frame-work  by  which  it  is 
surrounded.  There  are  varieties  in  this  respect 
— and  it  may  he  exemplified  perhaps,  tc  a  certain 
degree,  in  the  difference  which  is  felt  between 
moral  and  mathematical  truth.  The  latter,  not- 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


95 


withstanding  of  its  abstract  character,  does  not 
leave  the  mind  wholly  impassive;  as  we  are  sure 
that  those  who  have  walked  with  delighted  foot¬ 
steps  from  one  truth  and  demonstration  to  another, 
must  often  have  experienced.  The  former  again 
hath  less  of  that  emotion  to  reward  its  votaries 
which  cometh  of  pure  intellect  alone ;  but  this  is 
more  than  compensated  by  emotions  of  a  still 
higher  order — even  those  that  are  associated  with 
the  charities  of  the  heart,  with  the  sensibilities  of 
virtue  both  to  the  right  and  to  the  wrong,  its  ad¬ 
miration  of  lofty  worth,  its  high-toned  recoil  from 
all  that  wears  upon  it  the  character  of  moral  turpi¬ 
tude.  The  one  is  of  pure  science,  and  seated  in 
some  high  empyreal  region  where  all  is  calm  and 
clear,  and  pleasure  too  is  inhaled;  but  it  is  the 
pleasure  of  an  ineffable  quietism.  The  other  is  of 
sentiment  as  well  as  science ;  and  its  more  charac¬ 
teristic  abode  were  an  Elysium  of  exprest  sym¬ 
pathy,  a  place  where,  instead  of  each  luxuriating 
apart  in  his  own  beatific  contemplations,  the  delight 
is  multiplied  a  thousand  fold  by  its  being  made 
to  pass  and  to  reciprocate  from  one  happy  being 
to  another — where,  in  the  language  of  Milton,  a 
voice  is  heard  that  is  “  loud  as  from  numbers  with¬ 
out  number,  sweet  as  from  blest  spirits  uttering 
joy,  where  Heaven  rings  jubilee,  and  loud  Hos¬ 
annahs  fill  the  eternal  regions.” 

8.  Deep  emotion  is  a  distinct  and  a  distinguish¬ 
able  thing  from  violent  agitation.  Its  name  is 
originally  derived,  we  have  no  doubt,  from  the 
connexion  which  subsists  between  the  affections. of 
tDe  mind  and  the  visible  movements  of  the  body— 


96 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


yet  it  is  now  extended  to  every  mental  feeling,  and 
in  many  instances  the  more  intense  these  feelings 
the  more  might  they  rivet  the  body  into  immove¬ 
able  stillness.  Did  we  behold  two  spectators, 
overlooking  from  an  eminence  some  noble  panorama 
of  nature  that  was  before  them ;  and  that  the  one 
exclaimed  or  gesticulated  his  raptures,  while  the 
other  stood  in  fixed  and  silent  admiration — we 
should  certainly  conceive  that  the  emotions  of  the 
latter  M  ere  the  deeper  and  more  powerful  of  the 
two,  and  surely  by  far  the  more  dignified.  This 
is  an  age,  it  may  he  remarked,  in  which  the  appetite 
for  those  more  violent  emotions  that  are  caused  by 
eloquence  and  sentiment,  hath  overborne  the  ap¬ 
petite  for  the  tranquil  emotions  of  intellect — and 
so  it  is,  we  believe,  that  the  riot  and  the  turbulence 
and  the  deafening  plaudits  of  a  theatre  have  been 
introduced  of  late  into  our  universities,  and  with  a 
vigour  and  vehemence  enough  to  frighten  the 
genius  of  philosophy  av^ay  from  the  retreats  where 
it  would  fondly  linger,  and  force  her  to  resign  as 
it  M  ere  this  her  last  asylum  to  the  invasions  of  a 
rude  and  boisterous  M'orld.  While  we  advocate 
the  cause  of  the  emotions ;  and  M  ould  class  some  of 
them  with  the  very  highest  attributes  of  mind,  and 
as  in  fact  ministering  to  its  best  and  purest  enjoy¬ 
ments — yet  Me  cannot  be  blind  to  a  distinction  as 
wide  between  one  set  and  another,  as  there  is 
betM’een  the  deep  though  subdued  feeling  of  a 
cultivated  assembly,  and  the  fierce  ejaculations  of 
an  unbridled  midtitude. 

9.  To  judge,  and  to  remember,  and  to  reason 
— tliese  all  belong  to  the  intellectual  part  of  our 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


97 


nature ;  and  it  is  by  this,  that  man  is  conceived  to 
he  most  elevated  above  the  inferior  animals,  and 
to  be  most  assimilated  to  the  higher  orders  of 
creation.  Again,  to  delight  himself  with  the  satis¬ 
factions  of  sense,  to  luxuriate  amid  those  sweets 
that  minister  to  the  enjoyment  of  the  palate  or  to 
any  of  the  bodily  organs,  to  riot  in  any  of  those 
grosser  indulgencies  whereof  the  beasts  of  the  field 
are  as  capable  as  himself ;  it  is  when  thus  occupied, 
that  man  is  thought  to  sink  into  the  animal,  and 
to  degrade  himself  into  the  most  prostrate  condi¬ 
tion  of  inferiority  beneath  those  ethereal  beings, 
who  move  in  the  splendour  and  mystery  of  the 
upper  regions.  Between  the  two  parts  of  our 
nature — between  the  intellectual  and  the  merely 
sensitive,  lie  the  emotions ;  and  they  are  accord- 
ingl}’’  conceived  somewhat  to  partake  in  the  gross¬ 
ness  of  the  one,  and  somewhat  to  partake  in  the 
ethereal  character  of  the  other.  It  seems  greatly 
to  confirm  this  apprehension,  that  in  fact  the  lower 
animals  do  share  with  us  in  certain  of  these  emo¬ 
tions — in  anger  and  fear  most  unequivocally;  in 
the  instinctive  affection  at  least  of  one  relationship, 
that  of  a  mother  to  its  offspring,  with  no  less  cer¬ 
tainty  ;  perhaps  in  gratitude,  as  exemplified  by  the 
devotedness  of  a  dog  to  its  master ;  perhaps  even 
in  friendship,  as  indicated  by  the  attachment  of  the 
same  animal  to  some  one  or  other  of  the  human 
species,  even  when  no  favours  have  been  conferred 
upon  it.  And  thus  it  is  that  emotions  are  very 
generally  apprehended,  as  having  something  in 
them  of  a  common  quality  with  mere  animal  na¬ 
ture — as  having  in  them,  so  to  speak,  a  certain 
VOL.  V.  B 


98 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


taint  of  materialism — insomuch  that  whenever 
feeling  is  blended  with  thought,  the  pure  quality 
of  intelligence  is  conceived  to  be  somewhat  debased, 
as  if  by  the  admixture  of  an  earthly  ingredient. 
It  is  felt  as  if  the  celestial  light  of  the  mind  were 
to  a  certain  degree  sullied ;  when  the  agitations  of 
sensibility  are  in  any  way  superadded  to  the  clear 
and  the  calm  exercises  of  the  understanding — as  if  a 
disturbance  was  thereby  given  to  the  intellectual 
element,  which  must  be  kept  tranquil,  it  is  thought, 
in  order  to  be  kept  in  the  state  of  cloudless  trans¬ 
parency,  wherein  its  perfection  and  the  perfection 
of  every  intellectual  being  is  conceived  to  lie.  If 
we  have  any  doubt  of  this  being  a  very  general 
impression  in  regard  to  the  emotions,  we  will, 
perhaps  be  at  once  convinced,  when  we  reflect  on 
the  extreme  jealousy  entertained  by  almost  all 
Theists  and  all  Theologians,  whether  they  be 
those  of  Natural  Religion  or  Christianity,  when 
any  sensibilities  whatever  are  ascribed  to  the  God¬ 
head.  They  would  divest  Him  in  fact  of  all 
emotions;  and  conceive  it  indispensable  to  the 
perfection  of  His  nature  that  He  should  be  exhi¬ 
bited  in  their  demonstrations,  as  a  sort  of  abstract 
and  impassive  and  serenely  immoveable  nature — 
to  whose  power  and  knowledge  and  wisdom  we  can 
assign  no  limitations ;  but  in  whom  the  very  infinity 
of  these  attributes  supersedes  anger  and  grief  and 
joy,  and  in  short  any  of  those  internal  workings 
which  can  be  at  all  felt  as  our  emotions  are,  or 
can  at  all  agitate  as  our  emotions  do.  Nay,  the 
very  love  that  the  Deity  has  to  moral  excellence 
in  his  creatures,  unlike  to  our  reverence  and 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


99 


regard  for  the  same  which  is  deeply  felt  by  us  in 
the  shape  of  a  most  intense  emotion — this  love  is 
stript  of  all  the  characters  of  emotion,  and  reduced 
as  it  were  to  a  kind  of  abstract  and  intellectual 
preference  of  that  which  He  clearly  discerns  to  be 
good  to  that  which  He  clearly  discerns  to  be  evil. 
In  this  way  the  character  of  the  Supreme  is  de¬ 
nuded  of  all  its  warmth,  and  all  its  tenderness ; 
and  elevated  far  above  the  range  of  our  human 
sympathies,  he  is  represented  as  sitting  in  cold 
and  motionless  abstraction ;  and  as  precluded  by 
the  very  incapacity  of  emotion  from  all  congenial 
fellowship  with  the  creatures  whom  He  has  formed. 

10.  Now  we  hold  it  of  very  great  importance 
to  understand,  that  it  is  not  with  many  of  the  mental 
emotions  as  it  is  with  the  sensitive  atfections  of  our 
nature — that  though  we  may  be  said  to  refine  and 
to  perfect  the  character  of  man  in  proportion  as 
we  weaken  the  influence  of  the  latter ;  yet  by 
stripping  him  of  the  former,  by  taking  away  from 
him  emotions,  and  leaving  him  in  possession  of 
intellect  alone,  we  should  not  refine  the  man,  but 
we  should  mutilate  him.  There  has  been  such  a 
confounding  of  the  two  as  leads  very  generally  to 
the  imagination,  that  man  must  be  stript  of  both 
ere  he  can  make  full  escape  from  the  dross  of  an 
earthly  nature  ;  and  ere,  freed  from  the  impedi¬ 
ments  that  keep  him  down,  he  can  attain  to  the 
state  of  the  celestial  beings.  Now,  instead  of  this, 
there  are  certain  of  his  emotions  as  purely  and 
more  distinctively  celestial  than  are  any  of  the  evo¬ 
lutions  of  his  intellectual  nature.  There  are  a  fire 
and  a  fervency  more  truly  seraphic,  than  the  loftiest 


100 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


flight  of  which  the  understanding  is  capable.  It  is 
not  needful  for  the  perfection  of  his  nature,  that 
he  be  pruned  of  all  his  sensibilities — for  some  of 
these  sensibilities  are  in  fact  among  the  most  precious 
and  indispensable  elements  of  his  perfection ;  for 
example  those  which  devote  all  the  longings  and 
energies  of  his  soul  to  the  pursuit  of  moral  excel¬ 
lence,  and  those  in  virtue  of  which  he  recoils  with 
quick  and  sensitive  alarm  from  even  the  minutest 
violations  of  it.  We  think  that  both  our  natural 
and  our  Christian  theology  have  suffered  from  the 
very  imagination,  which  we  are  now  attempting  to 
expose.  The  metaphysical  divinity  of  our  schools 
does  not  represent  aright  the  character  of  Him  who 
is  our  living  sovereign  ;  who,  all  omniscient  as  He 
is,  is  not  on  that  account  devoid  of  most  intense 
and  energetic  emotion;  but  to  whom  the  distinc¬ 
tions  of  morality,  are  the  objects  of  feeling  as  well 
as  of  clear  and  unerring  discernment,  in  that  He 
not  only  knoweth  but  loveth  righteousness,  in  that 
He  not  only  judgeth  but  hateth  iniquity. 

11.  We  would  therefore  keep  by  the  scriptural, 
rather  than  the  scholastic  representation  of  the 
Deity.  When  told  on  the  authority  of  revelation 
that  God  loves,  that  He  resents,  that  He  is  jealous 
of  His  honour,  that  He  is  angry  with  the  wicked 
every  day,  and  longs  for  the  repentance  and  the 
return  of  His  strayed  children — we  would  not,  for 
a  merely  theoretic  object,  scrutinise  into  the  mys¬ 
teries  of  the  divine  nature ;  but  neither  would 
we  deafen  the  effect  of  expressions  so  distinct  and 
literal  as  these,  by  a  metaphysics  that  would  strip 
them  of  all  application  and  all  significancy  whatever. 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


101 


We  would  not  forego  the  influence  of  such  obvious 
announcements  regarding  his  Maker,  on  the  unso¬ 
phisticated  mind  of  a  peasant ;  and  we  even  believe 
that  theologically  he  has  a  more  correct  view  of 
the  Father  and  Governor  of  men,  than  the  mere 
pupil  of  academic  demonstration.  A  God  of 
naked  intelligence  and  power  is  not  the  God  of 
Christianity — that  God  manifest  in  the  flesh,  who 
is  the  brightness  of  His  Father’s  glory  and  the 
express  image  of  His  person.  His  life  on  earth 
was  one  of  deepest  sensibility  as  well  as  of  deepest 
sacredness — one  continued  history  of  pathetic 
expostulation  with  the  perversities  of  men  whom 
He  came  to  seek  and  to  save  ;  and  in  its  most  inte¬ 
resting  passages  did  He  give  forth  most  powerful 
and  picturesque  exhibition  of  a  nature  touched 
with  the  feelings  of  humanity,  as  when  He  wept 
at  the  tomb  of  Lazarus,  and  shed  the  tears  of  a 
profounder  sorrow  for  the  families  of  Jerusalem 
as  He  sat  over  the  city  and  bethought  Him  of  its 
approaching  desolation.  To  settle  our  theism 
aright,  this  is  the  resemblance  that  we  should  carry 
upward  to  the  throne  of  Heaven — where,  instead 
of  the  frigid  divinity  of  the  schools,  we  might 
yield  the  warm  responses  of  the  heart  to  a  gracious 
and  a  living  Sovereign,  unknown  to  that  cold 
philosophy  which  would  degrade  the  emotions, 
and  banish  them  altogether  from  the  upper  spheres 
of  the  universe.  For  the  great  purposes  of  an  effec¬ 
tive  moral  regimen  in  the  world,  we  must  uphold 
in  all  its  entireness  the  character  of  the  Deity,  as 
set  forth  in  the  Bible ;  and  neither  strip  it  of  that 
love  by  which  He  invites  the  confidence  and  love 


102 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


of  His  creatures  back  again,  nor  of  that  hatred  to 
sin  by  the  demonstrations  of  which  He  would 
strike  terror  into  the  hearts  of  the  rebellious  and 
reclaim,  if  possible,  from  the  habits  of  their  stub¬ 
born  nature,  those  stout-hearted  offenders  who 
spend  the  existence  which  He  has  given  them  in 
defiance  to  his  authority  and  His  law. 

12.  Christianity  places  us  on  the  highest  vantage 
ground,  whence  to  vindicate  and  exalt  the  emotions, 
and  to  rescue  this  department  of  our  nature  from 
those  who  would  degrade  it  to  a  sort  of  midway 
place  between  the  animal  and  the  rational.  There 
is  one  of  the  emotions  in  the  power  and  prevalence 
of  which  the  whole  moral  law  is  summarily  compre¬ 
hended — that  of  love — high  therefore,  as  virtue ; 
and  in  itself  the  very  element  of  heaven,  that  eternal 
abode  of  seraphic  love  and  seraphic  ecstasy,  where 
knowledge  in  its  present  forms  will  vanish  away, 
but  where  there  will  reign  triumphantly  and  for 
ever  the  charity  that  never  faileth. 

13.  But  to  prosecute  a  little  further  this  com¬ 
parison  between  the  intellectual  and  the  emotional 
departments  of  our  nature — there  is  a  pleasure  in 
the  mere  exercise  of  the  reasoning  faculty,  indepen¬ 
dently  of  that  pleasure  or  advantage  which  there 
is  in  the  result  to  which  we  are  conducted  by  it. 
There  is  a  pleasure  in  our  progress  towards  truth, 
as  well  as  in  the  full  prospect  and  possession  of 
the  truth  itself.  The  path  of  science  is  delightful, 
as  well  as  its  final  landing-place.  And  we  know 
not  whether  there  is  not  sometimes  as  much  of  felt 
triumph  and  ecstasy,  in  the  full  march  of  a  success- 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


103 


ful  argument,  as  in  the  magnificent  conclusion  to 
which  it  carries  us.  And  yet  who  on  that  account 
would  deny  that  the  conclusion  was  the  terminating 
object  of  the  process  ;  and  that  to  the  argumenta¬ 
tive  part  belonged  only  the  instrumental  office  of 
guiding  us  onw^ard  to  it  ?  There  is  an  enjoyment 
in  the  process  of  eating ;  but,  so  far  from  this  being 
a  more  valuable  consideration  than  the  health  and 
preservation  of  the  animal  economy  to  which  food 
is  subservient — it  was  to  secure  this  latter  object, 
that  an  enjoyment  was  annexed  to  the  use  of  food. 
And  so  of  the  enjoyment  which  there  is  in  the  pro¬ 
cess  of  reasoning,  in  the  play  and  exercise  of  our 
intellectual  faculties — annexed  by  the  author  of 
our  mental  economy,  not  because  argumentation 
is  an  end  of  itself,  but  because  of  the  surpassing 
worth  and  importance  of  another  end  that  is  quite 
ulterior  to  it.  It  is  well  that  there  is  so  much  of 
attraction  and  delight  even  in  the  path  of  discovery ; 
but,  like  every  other  path,  it  is  not  along  the  line 
of  it,  but  at  the  consummation  of  it,  where  its 
chief  usefulness  lies.  It  were  surely  a  most  pre¬ 
posterous  exaltation  of  the  means  above  the  end, 
if,  amid  all  the  mental  happiness  of  that  process 
by  which  truth  is  sought  after,  it  were  not  a  better 
and  a  nobler  condition  to  which  man  is  elevated, 
after  that  the  truth  is  found  and  the  truth  is  gazed 
upon.  The  geometry  of  Newton  is  but  that  series 
of  steps  which  bears  toward  a  vantage-ground, 
whence,  with  ravished  eye,  the  inquirer  can  look  c  i 
the  system  of  the  heavens,  dhe  analytic  process  jS 
of  chemistry  are  but  the  devices  of  human  art, 
wherewith  to  lure  from  its  hiding-place  the  minute 


104 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


and  interior  economy  of  Nature ;  and,  whatever 
the  entertainment  may  be  in  the  act  of  probing  for 
the  secret,  its  full  revelation  is  surely  that  alone 
in  which  the  mind  rests,  and  by  which  it  is 
rewarded.  And  so  of  the  demonstrations  of 
political  science,  by  which  the  economy  of  social 
life  is  unfolded — there  is  a  pleasure  in  the  very 
movements  of  that  gradual  approximation  by  which 
we  obtain  a  nearer  and  a  distincter  view  of  its 
mechanism ;  but,  unless  the  pursuit  of  an  object 
be  a  better  thing  than  the  possession  of  it,  unless 
the  act  of  learning  be  better  than  the  acquirement 
of  knowing,  unless  it  is  better  to  linger  eternally 
in  the  path  on  which  we  tread,  than  ever  to  reach 
that  place  of  arrival  to  which  we  are  travelling — 
then  better  far  than  to  grope  after  the  truth  which 
is  yet  undisclosed,  is  it  to  contemplate  the  full  and 
finished  manifestation  of  it. 

14.  This  may  lead  us  to  at  least  one  compara¬ 
tive  view,  between  an  intellectual  state  and  a  state 
of  emotion.  It  is  through  a  succession  of  the 
former  states  that  we  are  conducted  to  the  latter. 
It  is  by  along  and  sustained  march  of  reasonings  that 
we  at  length  arrive  at  a  sight  of  the  Planetary 
System  ;  and  the  delight  which  is  felt  in  this  mag¬ 
nificent  survey,  is  at  once  the  recompense  and  the 
consummation  of  our  intellectual  labours.  To 
speak  of  the  capacity  of  reasoning  which  leads  to 
some  noble  contemplation,  as  being  of  a  higher 
order  than  the  capacity  by  which  we  feel  its  noble¬ 
ness,  and  gather  from  the  scene  of  wonders  that 
we  look  upon,  gather  from  the  very  look  a  corre¬ 
sponding  aggrandizement  upon  our  own  souls — 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


105 


this  appears  to  be  as  complete  an^  inversion  in  our 
estimate  of  things,  as  to  say  that  the  faculty  of 
locomotion  by  which  we  climb  to  the  top  of  an 
eminence,  is  a  sublimer  faculty  than  that  by  which 
we  inhale  a  glory  to  our  own  spirits,  from  the 
glories  of  the  landscape  that  is  now  stretched  out 
before  us.  The  terminating  object  of  delight  and 
desire  is  surely  of  superior  consideration,  to  either 
the  intervening  medium  through  which  we  per¬ 
ceive,  or  the  intervening  distance  by  which  we 
arrive  at  it.  The  reasoning  process  is  indispen¬ 
sable,  just  as  means  are  to  the  attainment  of  an 
end  ;  but  if  an  end  be  worthier  than  its  means, 
then  may  the  faculty  of  those  emotions  which  truth 
awakens  be  of  more  exalted  character  than  the 
faculty  of  those  intellectual  processes  by  which 
truth  is  investigated.  The  latter  is  but  as  a  hand¬ 
maid  to  the  former  ;  and,  pure  and  exquisite  as  the 
gratifications  that  spring  from  the  exercise  of  reason 
may  be,  they  stand  but  in  the  relation  of  subser¬ 
viency  to  still  higher  and  nobler  gratifications. 

15.  This  will  stppear  more  obvious  when  we 
put  the  supposition,  that,  with  a  higher  order  of 
faculties  than  those  Avhich  we  possess,  all  our 
existing  knowledge  might  have  been  realized, 
without  the  aid  or^  the  intervention  of  any  reason¬ 
ing  process  at  all.  It  is  quite  conceivable,  that, 
in  virtue  of  a  more  gifted  intellect,  we  could  at 
once  have  descried  both  the  mechanism  and  the 
magnitude  of  our  planetary  system,  which  we  are 
now  enabled  to  do  by  the  disclosures  of  the  tele¬ 
scope  and  the  demonstrations  of  geometry.  Whether 
would  that  knowledge  have  been  the  less  valuable, 

B  2 


106 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


because  then  more  rapidly  or  rather  immediately 
seized  upon?  Would  it  have  been  less  subser¬ 
vient  to  any  one  purpose  of  guidance  or  of  practi¬ 
cal  utility,  than  it  is  at  this  moment  ?  Above  all, 
would  the  great  and  the  gorgeous  spectacle  have 
been  the  less  impressive,  whether  viewed  in  its 
own  magnificence,  or  in  the  testimony  which  it 
gave  to  the  might  and  the  magnificence  of  its 
great  Architect?  Will  the  emotions  of  a  seraph 
have  less  in  them  of  the  transcendental  and  the 
great  than  those  of  a  philosopher ;  because  the 
former  can  at  one  comprehensive  glance  behold 
that  system  in  all  its  intricacies  and  in  all  its  vast¬ 
ness,  to  which  the  latter  can  only  find  his  way  by 
months  and  years  of  toilsome  perseverance  ?  In 
other  words,  that  reason  which  is  thought  to  dig¬ 
nify  man,  only  bears  him  up  against  the  defect  and 
the  impotency  of  his  other  attributes.  He  were  a 
nobler  creature  still,  if  reason  were  superseded  by 
the  clearness  and  the  vigour  of  his  immediate  per¬ 
ceptions;  and  if  those- truths  which  he  now  reaches 
by  a  process  of  tardy  and  laborious  argumen¬ 
tation,  were  to  fall  with  the  light  and  the  evidence 
of  so  many  axioms  upon  his  understanding.  But 
that  very  elevation  which  superseded  the  reasoning 
faculty,  would  leave  all  the  emotions  as  freshly 
and  feelingly  alive  to  all  their  corresponding  objects 
as  before.  The  accession  to  man’s  power  of 
science  by  which  he  could  unravel,  and  with  the 
rapidity  of  intuition,  the  mysteries  of  Nature, 
would  not  annihilate  the  power  of  Nature  over  the 
sensibilities  of  man ;  and  still,  with  all  its  glories 
in  full  and  finished  revelation  before  him,  would 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


107 


he  f^o  all  the  homage  that  he  wont  to  the  richness 
of  creation,  and  to  the  majesty  and  the  goodness 
of  its  author.  After  that  reason  had  been  absorbed 
in  the  higher  faculties  of  his  now  elevated  nature, 
the  heart  would  continue  to  glow  with  all  its  fer¬ 
vencies  ;  and  whereas  there  be  many  who  would 
exalt  the  understanding  of  man  at  the  expense  of  his 
emotions — in  this  nobler  condition  of  his  properties 
and  powers,  should  we  behold,  that  while  one  of 
the  proudest  attributes  of  his  understanding  had 
vanished  away,  his  emotions  remained  with  him. 

16.  And  the  same  of  Chemistry.  It  is  by 
analysis  that  the  mysteries  of  that  hidden  world 
are  evolved.  But  this  analysis  were  uncalled  for, 
had  we  only  eyes  of  such  powerful  and  piercing 
inspection,  as  that  we  could  see  every  particle  of 
matter  and  trace  the  corpuscular  movements  to 
which  each  and  all  of  them  are  liable.  The  object 
of  all  the  investigating  processes  in  this  science,  is 
to  repair  the  deficiency  of  our  senses;  and  all 
experiment  and  all  inference  would  be  superseded, 
did  we  but  see  with  more  force  and  distinctness 
than  we  do  at  present.  Superior  beings  will 
look  on  the  way  by  which  we  overcome  the  impe¬ 
diments  of  our  less  gifted  nature,  just  as  we  do  on 
the  dexterity  or  trick  of  some  animal  beneath  us — 
“  will  show  a  Newton  as  we  show  an  ape.  All 
our  intellectual  processes  are  but  so  many  devices 
by  which  we  may  see  at  length,  that  which  they 
see  at  once ;  and  were  we  preferred  to  the  rank 
which  they  occupy,  they  are  processes  that  might 
one  and  all  of  them  be  dispensed  with.  But  stid 
the  emotions  would  retain  their  place  and  their 


108 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


importance  in  the  constitution  of  our  nature ;  and 
admitted  then  to  a  quick  and  a  clear  insight  among 
the  arcana  of  the  Divine  workmanship,  there 
would  continue  in  us  still,  or  rather,  there  would 
be  enhanced  to  far  greater  sensibility  than  before, 
our  admiration  of  Nature’s  mechanism,  and  of  the 
exquisite  skilfulness  of  Him  who  framed  it — “  It  is 
the  great  office  of  the  analytic  art  of  chemistry  to 
do  for  us  only  what  the  microscope  does,  that 
enables  us  to  see  the  small  objects,  which  are 
before  us  at  all  times,  without  our  being  able  to 
distinguish  them.  When  a  chemist  tells  us,  that 
glass,  which  appears  to  us  one  uniform  substance, 
is  composed  of  different  substances,  he  tells  us, 
what,  with  livelier  perceptive  organs,  we  might 
have  known,  without  a  single  experiment;  since 
the  siliceous  matter  and  the  alkali  were  present  to 
us  in  every  piece  of  glass,  as  much  before  he  told 
us  of  their  presence,  as  after  it.  The  art  of 
analysis,  therefore,  has  its  origin  in  the  mere  im¬ 
perfection  of  our  senses,  and  is  truly  the  art  of  the 
hlincl,  whose  wants  it  is  always  striving  to  remedy, 
and  always  discovering  sufficient  proof  of  its  ina¬ 
bility  to  remedy  them. 

“  We  boast,  indeed,  of  the  chemical  discoveries 
which  we  have  made  of  late,  Avith  a  rapidity  of 
progress  as  brilliant,  as  it  is  unexampled  in  the 
history  of  any  other  science ;  and  we  boast  justly, 
because  we  have  found,  what  the  generations  of 
inquirers  that  have  preceded  us  on  our  globe,  far 
from  detecting,  have  not  even  ventured  to  guess. 
Without  alluding  to  the  agency  of  the  galvanic 
power,  by  which  all  nature  seems  to  be  assuming 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


109 


before  us  a  different  aspect,  we  have  seen  in  the 
products  of  our  common  fires,  and  in  the  drossy 
rust  of  metals,  the  purest  part  of  that  ethereal 
fluid  which  we  breathe,  and  the  air  itself,  which 
was  so  long  considered  as  simple,  ceasing  to  be  an 
element.  Yet,  whatever  unsuspected  similarities 
and  diversities  of  composition  we  may  have  been 
able  to  trace  in  bodies,  all  our  discoveries  have 
not  created  a  single  new  particle  of  matter.  1  hey 
have  only  shown  those  to  exist,  where  they  always 
existed,  as  much  before  our  analysis  as  after  it, 
unmarked  indeed,  but  unmarked,  only  because 
our  senses  alone  were  not  capable  of  making  the 
nice  discrimination.  If  man  had  been  able  to 
perceive,  with  his  mere  organ  of  sense,  the  differ¬ 
ent  particles  that  form  together  the  atmospheric 
air— if  he  had  at  all  times  seen  the  portion  of 
these  which  unites  with  the  fuel  that  warms  him, 
enter  into  this  union,  as  distinctly  as  he  sees  the 
mass  of  fuel  itself,  which  he  flings  into  his  furnace, 
he  could  not  have  thought  it  a  very  great  intellec¬ 
tual  achievement,  to  state  in  words  so  common 
and  familiar  a  fact,  the  ^  mere  well  known  change 
of  place  of  a  few  well  known  particles ;  and  yet 
this  is  what,  in  the  imperfect  state  of  his  percep¬ 
tive  organs,  he  so  proudly  terms  his  Theory  of  Com¬ 
bustion,  the  development  of  which  was  hailed  by 
a  wondering  world,  and  in  these  circumstances 
justly  hailed  by  it  as  a  scientific  era.  To  beings, 
capable  of  perceiving  and  of  distinguishing  the 
different  particles,  that  form,  by  their  aggregation, 
those  small  masses,  which,  after  the  minutest 
mechanical  division  of  which  we  are  capable,  ap- 


no 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


pear  atoms  to  us,  the  pride  which  we  feel,  in  our 
chymical  analysis,  must  seem  as  ludicrous,  as  to 
us  would  seem  the  pride  of  the  blind,  if  one,  who 
had  never  enjoyed  the  opportunity  of  beholding 
the  sun,  were  to  boast  of  having  discovered,  hy  a  nice 
comparison  of  the  changing  temperature  of  bodies, 
that  during  certain  hours  of  the  day,  there  passed 
over  our  earth  some  great  source  of  heat.  The 
addition  of  one  new  sense  to  us,  Avho  have  already 
the  inestimable  advantages  which  vision  affords, 
might  probably,  in  a  few  hours,  communicate  more 
instruction,  with  respect  to  matter,  than  all  which 
is  ever  to  repay  and  consummate  the  physical 
labours  of  mankind,  giving,  perhaps,  to  a  single 
glance,  those  slow  revelations  of  Nature,  which, 
one  by  one,  at  intervals  of  many  centuries,  are  to 
immortalize  the  future  sages  of  our  race.” 

“  All  Philosophy,”  says  an  acute  foreign  writer, 
“  is  founded  on  these  two  things — that  we  have  a 
great  deal  of  curiosity,  and  very  bad  eyes.  In 
astronomy,  for  example,  if  our  eyes  were  better, 
we  should  then  see  distinctly,  whether  the  stars 
really  are,  or  are  not,  so  many  suns,  illuminating 
worlds  of  their  own;  and  if,  on  the  other  hand, 
we  had  less  curiosity,  we  should  then  care  very 
little  about  this  knowledge,  which  would  come 
pretty  nearly  to  the  same  thing.  But  we  wish  to 
know  more  than  we  see,  and  there  lies  the  diffi¬ 
culty.  Even  if  we  saw  well  the  little  which  we 
do  see,  this  would  at  least  be  some  small  know¬ 
ledge  gained.  But  we  observe  it  different  from 
what  it  is  ;  and  thus  it  happens,  that  a  true  philo¬ 
sopher  passes  his  life,  in  not  believing  what  he 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


Ill 


sees,  and  in  labouring  to  guess  what  is  altogether 
beyond  his  sight.  I  cannot  help  figuring  to 
myself,”  continues  the  same  lively  writer,  “  that 
Nature  is  a  great  public  spectacle,  which  resem¬ 
bles  that  of  the  opera.  From  the  place  at  which 
we  sit  in  the  theatre,  we  do  not  see  the  stage 
quite  as  it  is.  The  scenes  and  machinery  are 
arranged  so  as  to  produce  a  pleasing  effect  at  a 
distance ;  and  the  weights  and  pulleys,  on  which 
the  different  movements  depend,  are  hid  from  us. 
We  therefore  do  not  trouble  our  heads  with  guess¬ 
ing,  how  this  mechanical  part  of  the  performance 
is  carried  on.  It  is  perhaps  only  some  mechanist, 
concealed  amid  the  crowd  of  the  pit,  who  racks  his 
brain  about  a  flight  through  the  air,  which  appears 
to  him  eKtraordinary,  and  who  is  seriously  bent  on 
discovering  by  what  means  it  has  been  executed. 
This  mechanist  gazing,  and  wondering,  and  tor¬ 
menting  himself,  in  the  pit  of  the  opera,  is  in  a 
situation  very  like  that  of  the  philosopher,  in  the 
theatre  of  the  world.  But  what  augments  the 
difliculty  to  the  philosopher  is,  that,  in  the  machi¬ 
nery  which  Nature  presents,  the  cords  are  com¬ 
pletely  concealed  from  him, — so  completely  indeed, 
that  the  constant  puzzle  has  been  to  guess,  what 
that  secret  contrivance  is,  which  ^produces  the 
visible  motions  in  the  frame  of  the  universe.  Let 
us  imagine  all  the  sages  collected  at  an  opera, — 
the  Pythagorases,  Platos,  Aristotles,  and  all  those 
great  names,  which  now-a-days  make  so  much 
noise  in  our  ears.  Let  us  suppose,  that  they  see 
the  flight  of  Phaeton,  as  he  is  represented  carried 
off  by  the  winds  *  that  they  cannot  perceive  the 


112 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


cords  to  which  he  is  attached ;  and  that  they  £ire 
quite  ignorant  of  every  thing  behind  the  scenes. 
It  is  a  secret  virtue,  says  one  of  them,  that  carries 
off  Phaeton.  Phaeton,  says  another,  is  composed  of 
certain  members,  which  cause  him  to  ascend,  A 
third  says.  Phaeton  has  a  certain  affection  for  the 
top  of  the  stage.  He  does  not  feel  at  his  ease 
when  he  is  not  there.  Phaeton,  says  a  fourth,  is 
not  formed  to  fly ;  but  he  likes  better  to  fly,  than 
to  leave  the  top  of  the  stage  empty, — and  a  hun¬ 
dred  other  absurdities  of  the  kind,  that  might 
have  ruined  the  reputation  of  antiquity,  if  the 
reputation  of  antiquity  for  wisdom  could  have  been 
ruined.  At  last,  come  Descartes,  and  some 
other  moderns,  who  say.  Phaeton  ascends,  because 
he  is  drawn  by  cords,  and  because  a  weight,  more 
heavy  than  he,  is  descending  as  a  counterpoise. 
Accordingly,  we  now  no  longer  believe,  that  a 
body  will  stir,  unless  it  be  drawn  or  impelled  by 
some  other  body,  or  that  it  will  ascend,  or  descend, 
unless  by  the  operation  of  some  spring  or  counter¬ 
poise  ;  and  thus  to  see  Nature,  such  as  it  really  is, 
is  to  see  the  back  of  the  stage  at  the  opera.”* 

“  In  this  exposition  of  the  phenomena  of  the 
universe,  and  of  those  strange  ‘  follies  of  the  wise,’ 
which  have  been  gravely  propounded  in  the  sys¬ 
tems  of  philosophers  concerning  them,  there  is 
much  truth,  as  well  as  happy  pleasantry.  As  far, 
at  least,  as  relates  to  matter,  considered  merely  as 
existing  in  space, — the  first  of  the  two  lights  in 
which  it  may  be  physically  viewed, — there  can  be 


Fontenelle. 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


113 


no  question,  that  philosophy  is  nothing  more  than 
an  endeavour  to  repair,  by  art,  the  badness  of  oui 
eyes,  that  we  may  be  able  to  see  what  is  actually 
before  us  at  every  moment.”  Brown — Lecture  \ . 

17.  Kow  it  is  not  for  the  mere  purpose  of  ad¬ 
justing,  what  may  be  called,  a  sort  of  speculate  e 
precedency  between  the  intellect  and  the  emotions, 
that  w'e  now  indulge  in  these  remarks.  Ihere 
are  great  and  immediate  uses  to  which  this  estimate 
is  subservient — first  of  the  science  that  conducts 
to  the  knowdedge  of  its  objects,  and  secondly  of 
the  emotions  which  these  objects  are  fitted  to 
awaken.  If  indeed  the  first  be  to  the  second  what 
a  path  is  to  its  termination,  what  a  scaffold  is  to 
the  architecture,  what  a  vista  is  to  that  ulterior 
opening  where  a  wide  expanse  of  loveliness  and 
glory  presents  itself  to  the  eye  of  the  beholdei 
then,  if  there  be  any  device  by  which  the  objects 
of  science  can  be  credibly  exhibited  to  the  appre¬ 
hension  of  those  who  have  no  leisure  and  perhaps 
no  strength  for  the  profound  investigations  of  the 
science  itself  which  leads  to  them, — still,  although  ^ 
we  do  not  pass  them  through  the  intellectual  states ' 
by  which  the  attainments  of  philosophy  have  first 
been  won,  we  at  least  provide  them  with  all  those 
lofty  and  large  emotions,  which  give  in  fact  their  chief 
and  their  terminating  importance  to  the  truffis  of 
philosophy.  We  cannot  demonstrate  to  their  un¬ 
derstanding  the  physical  astronomy  of  the  heavens  ; 
but  we  can  give  them  the  understanding  of  its  actual 
astronomy.  We  cannot  expound,  with  the  whole 
rigour  and  certainty  of  mathematics,  the  principles 
of  the  science ;  but  we  can,  by  description  and  by 


114 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


palpable  diagram,  expound  to  them  the  facts  of 
the  science.  It  may  not  yet  be  possible  so  to 
school  the  artisan  and  the  labourer  in  the  doctrines 
of  those  great  forces  which  operate  in  space,  as 
that  they  might  infer,  and  with  all  the  precision  of 
geometry,  the  figure  and  the  aberrations  of  every 
orbit  that  is  on  high.  But  they  may  be  made  to 
comprehend  as  much  of  these  forces,  as  generally 
and  satisfactorily  to  perceive  how  it  is  that,  by 
dint  of  their  operation,  the  great  system  of  the 
universe  is  upholden.  The  whole  panorama  of 
the  heavens  may  be  as  vividly  represented  to 
their  mental  eye,  as  to  that  of  the  profoundest  of 
our  savans.  They  may  have  the  same  great  views 
of  nature’s  immensity;  and,  though  wholly  incapa¬ 
ble  of  that  severe  analysis  which  conducts  the 
philosopher  to  his  results,  they  may  have  as  lofty 
an  imagination  as  he,  of  that  mighty  apparatus  of 
suns  and  systems,  which  astronomy  has  unfolded, 
and  of  the  strength  of  that  Omnipotent  arm  on 
which  this  wondrous  mechanism  is  suspended.  In 
a  word,  although  they  should  not  be  furnished  with 
the  science,  they  may  be  furnished  with  the  whole 
moral  and  sentiment  of  Astronomy.  Though  un¬ 
able  to  trace  the  intricacy  of  its  nicer  movements, 
they  may  be  made  to  breathe  the  full  inspiration 
of  its  greatness;  and,  though  there  be  no  royal 
road  to  Geometry,  there  is  a  road  by  which  our 
now  unlettered  peasantry  may  be  led  to  view  the 
best  and  noblest  of  those  wonders  which  Geometry 
has  unfolded. 

18.  It  is  this  which  so  inclines  us  we  confess  to 
the  multiplication  of  mechanics’  schools.  It  is 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


115 


downright  pedantry  to  despise  them,  because  the 
views  which  are  there  given  must  be  popular  and 
so  must  be  superficial.  Let  science  be  sustained 
in  all  her  rigour  and  all  her  loftiness  in  our  schools 
of  philosophy ;  and  let  universities  rise  and  recede 
to  the  uttermost,  with  every  advance  that  is  made 
upon  them  by  the  people  of  the  land — so  as  to 
maintain,  if  possible,  all  the  relative  distance  and 
superiority  which  they  had,  even  in  those  days, 
when  without  their  walls  there  was  nought  but 
degrading  superstition,  and  within  their  walls  but 
the  elevation  above  it  of  degrading  monkery.  Let 
a  strict  and  severe  philosophy  be  the  regime  of 
our  colleges ;  but  we  repeat  that  it  is  the  disdain 
of  a  mind  unenlightened  as  to  the  real  merits  of 
the  question,  when  it  looks  with  portly  contempt 
on  the  laxer  and  larger  style  of  that  science  which 
should  have  leave  most  liberally  to  effuse  itself 
among  our  population.  They  are  not  led  along 
the  same  path  of  science  with  ourselves,  but  they 
are  conducted  to  a  sight  of  the  very  same  objects ; 
and  they  are  the  emotions,  we  repeat,  given  forth  by 
the  objects,  which  are  to  do  more  for  the  popular 
mind,  than  the  calculus  of  La  Place,  though  mas¬ 
tered  and  studied  by  them  all,  could  ever  have 
infused  into  them.  There  is,  and  more  especially 
in  the  mixed  mathematics,  the  utmost  difference 
betw’een  the  display  of  truth  and  the  demonstration 
of  it;  and  the  people  may  be  fit  subjects  for  the 
one,  w'hile  not  at  all  fit  for  the  other.  But  it  is 
in  the  display  of  truth,  and  not  on  the  demonstra¬ 
tion  of  it,  that  the  responding  emotions  are  awak¬ 
ened  in  the  soul.  It  is  in  the  prospect  of  truth 


116 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


set  before  us,  and  not  in  the  pathway  by  which 
we  are  led  to  it,  that  we  meet  with  the  most  pre¬ 
cious  rewards  and  the  best  influences  of  Philosophy. 
It  is  then  that  the  mind  gives  forth  of  its  homage 
to  the  greatness  and  the  importance  of  discoveries 
which  it  never  could  have  made ;  and,  when  thus 
employed,  gathers  upon  itself  a  certain  kindred 
nobleness  to  the  scene  of  its  contemplations.  It 
is  thus  that  even  though  we  should  not  make 
philosophers  of  the  people,  we  may  find  a  w^ay  to 
their  minds  for  the  purest  and  the  loftiest  inspira¬ 
tions  of  Philosophy.  There  is  a  distinction  to  be 
made  between  the  reasonings  of  Philosophy  and 
its  informations.  If  not  fully  trained  to  prosecute 
the  one,  they  can  at  least  be  presented  with  the 
other ;  and  they  are  mainly  the  informations  of 
Philosophy,  by  which  the  popular  mind  is  to  be 
exalted.  We  would  set  no  limit  on  its  capabilities 
of  improvement,  nor  grudge  even  now  the  Prin- 
cipia  of  Newdon  to  the  people,  if  they  had  the 
time  and  the  preparation  for  such  an  achievement. 
But,  in  defect  of  these,  we  should  go  forth  imme¬ 
diately;  and,  if  not  the  principles,  at  least  lay 
before  them  the  facts  of  the  Newtonian  system. 
They  may  not  understand  the  science  of  Astro¬ 
nomy;  but  they  can  understand  the  statements  of 
it.  They  can  be  made  to  know  what  sort  of  a 
universe  they  dwell  in ;  and  with  what  a  God  of 
might  and  of  presiding  majesty  it  is  that  they  have 
to  do.  It  is  thus  that  lofty  thoughts,  and  kindling 
imaginations,  and  all  the  elements  of  moral  great¬ 
ness,  may  be  thrown  abroad  over  the  face  of  our 
land.  Our  peasantry  would  thus  be  made  to 


CN  THE  EMOTIONS. 


1!7 


ascend  to  a  higher  mental  and  intellectual  status 

_ when  their  views  will  at  length  have  ascendency 

in  those  high  places  of  patronage  and  power,  where 
at  one  time  it  was  so  insolently  scorned ;  and  the 
majesty  of  the  people  will  become  the  dread, 
instead  of  as  then  a  derision,  to  those ,  heartless 
politicians  who  so  long  spurned  the  high  and  the 
holy  demands  of  principle  ;  and  forgat,  in  the 
lordliness  of  office,  what  be  the  firmest  props  of  a 
nation’s  welfare,  and  what  the  privileges  of  our 
common  nature. — And  on  this  subject,  we  would 
observe,  that  it  is  well,  it  gives  one’s  own  mind  the 
comfort  and  the  decision  of  a  firm  and  luminous 
consistency,  when  it  keeps  by  great  principles 
amid  every  fluctuation  of  politics.  We  know  not  a 
more  cheering  doctrine,  and  all  the  more  so  that 
we  think  it  admits  of  an  impregnable  demonstra¬ 
tion,  than  the  indefinite  capacities  of  the  common 
people,  by  dint  of  their  own  virtue  and  their  own 
prudence,  to  elevate  their  own  status  in  the  com- 
monw  ealth— and  that,  both  as  it  respects  a  larger 
sufficiency  of  the  comforts  of  life,  and  a  far  higher 
degree  not  of  moral  only  but  of  intellectual  culti¬ 
vation.  We  think  that  a  great  and  a  wholesale 
injustice  w'as  done  to  them  by  the  rulers  of  the 
last  generation,  who,  in  their  administration  of  the 
ecclesiastical  patronage,  bade  defiance  to  the  popu¬ 
lar  voice,  and  resisted  its  most  legitimate  demand 
for  a  pure  and  scriptural  Christianity  in  our  pul¬ 
pits.  This,  among  other  causes,  hastened  on 
that  fearful  decline,  wdiich  latterly  took  place  in 
the  Christianity  of  the  working  classes;  and,  to 
maintain  an  even-handed  impartiality  between  one 


118 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


government  and  another, ,  we  would  say,  that  if 
possible  for  one  set  of  rulers  to  speed  onward  the 
degeneracy  of  a  population,  it  is  equally  possible 
for  another,  with  hard  and'heartless  indifference, 
to  resist  every  effort  made  to  recal  them  from  the 
abyss  into  which  they  have  fallen.  Neither  policy 
can  be  regarded  with  any  other  feeling,  than  of 
the  utmost  moral  discomfort — though,  perhaps, 
the  more  hateful  of  the  two  is  that,  which,  with 
the  blazing  characters  pf  patriotisimand  liberty  on 
its  forehead,  would  still  .withhold  from  the  people 
the  best  and  cheapest  boon  which  c^in  be^graiited 
to  their  families — holding ,  them  in  np  other  mine, 
than  as  the  instruments  of  a  mischievous  fermen¬ 
tation,  the  brick-bat  auxiliaries  of  a  cause  that 
only  lives  by  delusion,  and  which  will  sink  into  its 
own  place  so  soon  as  the  eddying  turbulence  that 
keeps  it  afloat,  shall  have  subsided  into  the  calm¬ 
ness  of  better  and  wiser  and  more  pacific  times. 

19.  But  this  brings  us  direct  to  another  appli¬ 
cation  of  our  present  argument.  We  have  already 
said  of  science  in  general,  that,  unless  in  so  far  as 
the  truths  which  it  discovers  are  subservient  to  the 
practical  guidance  of  man  and  the  processes  of  art, 
its  main  importance  lies  in  the  emotions  which 
these  truths  are  fitted  to  awaken  ;  that,  aside  from 
its  subserviency  to  art,  this  in  fact,  is  the  termi¬ 
nating  object  of  all  science ;  and  that  the  reason¬ 
ings  which  led  to  the  discovery  are  but  the 
preparatory  steps,  by  which  the  inquirer  is  con¬ 
ducted  to  a  set  of  ultimate  gratifications — of  as 
much  a  higher  order  than  the  gratifications  of 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS.  119 

mere  intellect  as  the  end  is  more  valuable  than 
the  means,  or  as  the  consummation  of  any  process 
is  than  the  process  itself.  Knowledge  is  not  the 
inquirer’s  ultimate  landing-place ;  for  there  is 
something  ulterior  to  knowledge,  and  that  is  senti¬ 
ment.  Its  office  is  altogether  an  instrumental  one. 
Knowledge  is  the  parent  of  sentiment ;  and  it  is 
not  for  its  own  sake,  but  for  the  sake  of  that  which 
it  gives  birth  to,  that  it  deserves  to  be  so  intensely 
prosecuted  by  each,  and  so  widely  diffused  among 
all.  If  by  widening,  for  example,  our  prospect 
over  the  domain  of  Nature,  we  enhance  the  feeling 

that  we  before  had  of  the  dignity  of  its  architect _ 

this  is  a  more  precious  fruit  of  the  acquirement, 
than  the  acquirement  itself;  and  if  by  any  way, 
even  though  by  a  less  laborious  and  scientific  pro¬ 
cess  than  philosophers  do  traverse,  it  can  be  made 
the  acquirement  of  our  general  peasantry,  we  may 
not  yet  have  trained  them  in  that  way  of  learning 
which  is  strictly  academic  ;  but  w^e  may  anticipate 
the  toils  of  severe  intellect,  by  a  more  immediate 
presentation  of  the  objects  of  science  to  their  mind, 
and  so  by  an  excitement  of  those  sensibilities  in 
the  heart,  to  which  even  intellect  herself  is  but 
an  officiating  minister. 

20.  Now  what  holds  true  of  all  science,  holds 
most  eminently  true  of  the  science  of  theology. 
Here,  if  at  all,  the  mere  doctrine  is  never  the 
terminating  object,  but  the  practical  lesson  to 
which  it  points,  or  the  emotion  that  arises  upon 
the  contemplation  of  it.  Theology  is  a  science 
which  embraces  the  most  stupendous  interests — 
the  highest  interest  of  the  world  that  is  present. 


120 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


and  the  whole  interest  of  the  world  that  is  future 
and  eternal.  It  is  a  science  whose  contemplations 
involve  both  the  noblest  and  the  most  affecting 
sentiments — urging  at  one  time,  the  most  heroic, 
the  most  hardy  sacrifices  of  principle — and  at 
another,  looking  in  gentleness  on  frail  and  suffering 
men,  whether  it  speaks  peace  to  the  repentant,  or 
stretches  forth  the  balsam  of  its  promises  and  its 
precious  things  for  the  comfort  of  w^eeping  families. 
It  is  a  science  whose  illustrations,  even  the  most 
appropriate,  admit  of  all  that  is  beauteous  in  the 
imagery  of  Nature,  and  of  all  that  can  touch  and 
interest  the  heart  in  the  relations  of  human  society 
— for  what  is  beauty,  but  the  impress  of  the 
Almighty’s  artist  hand  on  the  face  of  His  own 
workmanship,  an  efflorescence  from  that  primeval 
Mind,  where  all  the  forms  both  of  grace  and  of 
grandeur  have  had  their  everlasting  residence — 
and  whatsis  society,  with  all  the  dear  and  delight¬ 
ful  sympathies  by  which  it  is  held  together,  but 
that  moral  mechanism  wdiich  Himself  did  devise, 
and  Himself  hath  instituted  ?  It  has  been  said 
of  God,  that  He  sits  enthroned  on  the  riches  of 
the  universe — and  all  these  riches,  then,  may  be 
regarded  as  legitimate  spoils  wherewith  to  magni¬ 
fy  and  adorn  the  representation  of  Him.  Now, 
theology,  if  viewed  only  as  a  science  of  truths, 
might  be  addressed  to  tbe  intellect  alone — but 
being  a  science  of  such  truths,  of  truths  which 
cannot  be  looked  to  in  their  native  character, 
cannot  be  looked  to  as  they  are,  without  awakening, 
if  dwelt  upon,  the  emotions  of  taste,  or  of  earnest 
desire,  or  of  moral  sensibility,  or  of  deepest  reve- 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


121 


rence — ^the  question  is,  whether  in  the  act  of 
expounding  them,  we,  laying  a  resolute  check  on 
these  various  affections  of  Nature,  are  to  keep  all 
but  the  understanding  in  abeyance  ?  Are  we  to 
treat  the  propositions  of  theology,  as  we  would  the 
naked  dogmata  of  an  abstract  science ;  and,  as  if 
we  had  nought  to  do  but  with  their  evidence  alone, 
are  we  to  withhold  the  homage  which  is  due  to 
their  properties,  by  withholding  the  response  of 
all  those  Avarm  and  holy  feelings  which  they  are 
fitted  to  awaken  ?  If  there  be  a  radiant  bright¬ 
ness  in  any  object  how  can  it  be  appropriately  or 
adequately  described,  even  though  with  all  the 
strict  and  imitative  accuracy  of  the  Flemish  school, 
but  in  colours  of  tlie  same  kindred  with  those  of  a 
picture  to  its  original? — and  yet,  when  so  de¬ 
scribed,  and  the  ambiguous  praise  of  splendour  is 
awarded,  it  is  almost  never  to  characterize  the 
inherent  glory  of  the  writer’s  theme,  but  the  tinsel 
of  the  Avriter’s  imagination.  Or,  if  it  be  a  ques¬ 
tion  of  deepest  moral  importance,  involving  the 
character  of  heaven’s  Lawgiver,  or,  the  destiny  of 
those  guilty  millions,  Avho  have  become  the  outcasts 
(tf  His  righteous  displeasure — how  can,  we  do  not 
say  the  eloquent,  but  hoAV  can  the  just  exposition 
be  given  of  it,  unless  the  emphasis  of  feeling  be 
SLiperadded  to  the  demonstrations  of  Heaven’s 
jurisprudence — yet  should  this  be  done  but  Avith 
half  the  vehemence,  or  half  the  tenderness  of  the 
saints  and  apostles  in  other  days,  how  many  now 
are  the  phlegmatic  theologians  who  will  complain 
of  truth  being  lost  and  overborne  in  a  whirlwind  of 
the  passions  ?  There  are  men  Avho  will  think  of 

VQL.  V.  F 


122 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


every  argument  we  employ,  that  it  ceases  to  be  a 
floCtrine  and  becomes  a  declamation,  unless  we 
sliall  treat  the  formularies  of  a  creed  with  the 
same  unimpassioned  frigidity,  that  we  would  the 
formularies  of  algebra — who  conceiving  it  impos¬ 
sible  that  any  object  can  at  the  same  time  be  seen 
correctly  and  felt  correctly,  would  have  all  sensibi¬ 
lities  displaced  to  make  room  for  their  syllogisms 
whose  prototype  of  an  accomplished  divine  may 
be  without  a  heart,  if  his  head  be  but  abundantly 
peopled  with  cold  and  naked  categories — if  neither 
alive  to  the  charms  of  Nature,  nor  to  the  surpass¬ 
ing  excellence  of  Nature’s  God,  he  could  lay  a 
stern  interdict  on  all  the  emotions,  and  sit  un¬ 
moved  amid  the  glories  of  a  universe. 

21.  In  all  this,  there  is  not  merely  an  aggres¬ 
sion  on  the  prerogatives  of  the  heart ;  but,  bringing 
the  question  under  the  standard  of  intellect  alone, 
there  is  in  it  something  unphilosophically  erroneous. 
We  so  far  concede  a  priority  to  the  claims  of 
intellect,  that  we  allow,  the  first  thing  to  be  done^ 
with  any  object  of  human  thought  is  to  apprehend 
it  correctly ;  and  it  is  cither  by  a  series  ot  reason¬ 
ings,  or  by  an  instant  recognition  of  the  judgment, 
that  we  come  to  apprehend  any  object  aright,  or 
simply  and  in  other  words,  to  see  it  as  it  is.  But 
if  it  be  an  object  fitted  when  thus  seen,  naturally 
and  spontaneously  fitted,  to  call  forth  certain 
emotions — then  if  these  emotions  have  not  been 
called  forth,  in  the  heart  of  any  individual,  he  is 
either  a  mutilated  and  imperfect  being,  or  he 
really  does  not  see  the  object  such  as  it  is.  His 
want  of  the  feeling  correspondent  to  the  object  is 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


123 


a  proof,  that  he  judges  of  it  wrong,  that  he  appre¬ 
hends  it  wrong.  If  a  man  be  as  little  moved  by 
the  perfections  of  the  Godhead,  as  he  is  by  the 
properties  of  a  triangle,  then  we  would  say  more 
than  that  he  does  not  adequately  feel  these  perfec¬ 
tions.  We  would  say  that  he  does  not  understand 
them.  He  may  march  triumphant  over  the  whole 
of  their  theological  demonstration ;  but  then  he  is 
only  playing  at  logic  with  words.  He  is  merely 
dealing  with  a  name,  or  a  formula,  or  a  verbal 
proposition ;  and  his  mind  is  not  in  converse,  by 
means  of  its  organ  of  discernment,  with  the  object 
to  be  discerned — unless  the  emotions  appropriate 
to  that  object  are  awakened  in  his  soul.  If  the 
eye  be  in  a  sound  state,  the  colour  of  red  im¬ 
presses  a  different  sensation  upon  it  from  the 
colour  of  green — and  if  the  difference  be  not  rightly 
felt,  it  is  just  because  it  is  not  rightly  perceived. 
The  want  of  the  appropriate  sensation  evinces  the 
want  of  the  right  and  appropriate  perception  ;  and 
this  connection  between  the  seeing  accurately  and 
the  feeling  accurately,  applies  to  moral  as  well  as 
material  objects  of  contemplation.  Our  first  care 
should  be  to  discern  them  aright ;  but  the  test  of 
our  doing  so  is  that  we  are  affected  by  them  aright. 
We  do  not  see  an  object  to  be  amiable,  if  the 
amiableness  be  unfelt  by  us.  We  see  it  not  to  be 
venerable,  if  we  do  not  feel  the  veneration.  We 
do  not  recognise  it  in  Its  character  of  solemnity 
and  sacredness,  unless  we  are  solemnized.  We 
are  but  holding  converse  with  a  name,  and  not 
with  a  thing,  unless  the  properties  of  that  thing 
call  forth  those  proper  sensibilities  which,  when 


124 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


really  seen,  they  are  calculated  to  awaken.  It  is 
by  a  process  of  inference  or  ratiocination,  that  we 
are  guided  onward  to  that  last  act  of  the  judgment, 
in  virtue  of  which  we  see  the  genuine  colours  and 
characteristics  of  any  objectof  our  thoughts — but  the 
test,  in  every  wholesome  mental  constitution,  of  see¬ 
ing  correctly,  is,  that  appropriate  response,  which 
the  object,  when  thus  apprehended,  meets  with  from 
the  feelings  and  the  faculties  of  our  whole  nature. 

22.  This  remark  which  extends  to  so  many  of 
the  sciences  holds  superlatively  true  of  theology. 
Here,  if  anywhere,  truth  of  perception,  if  not  identi¬ 
cal,  stands  most  intimately  associated  with  truth  of 
feeling.  We  cannot  proceed  a  little  way  in  its 
demonstrations,  without  coming  in  sight  of  objects, 
which  only  need  to  be  seen  justly,  in  order  to  be 
felt  sensibly  and  profoundly — and  precisely  accord¬ 
ing  to  the  vividness  of  the  perception  will  be  the 
vivacity  or  depth  of  the  emotion.  In  this  science, 
there  is  not  merely  a  yvcuatg,  which,  cold  and  spe¬ 
culative,  may  exist  apart  from  the  aya'Trri,  as  we 
are  informed  by  Paul,  when  he  says,  that  “  Know¬ 
ledge  puffeth  up,  but  charity  edifieth.”  But  along 
with  the  yvcoGig,  there  is  also  an  STriyvctXTtg,  a  more 
clear  and  thorough  and  intense  knowledge,  in 
proportion  to  which  there  will  always  be  a  more 
intense  corresponding  sensibility.  We  cannot, 
therefore,  bring  the  whole  man  to  the  investiga¬ 
tions  of  theology,  without  doing  violence  to  some 
part  of  him — if  we  lay  a  stern  interdict  on  the 
emotions.  Our  anterior  aim,  we  concede  with  as 
much  promptitude  as  w^e  should  an  axiom  or  a  first 
principle,  our  anterior  aim  should  be  to  have  a 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


125 


right  view  of  the  object.  But  we  are  not  there¬ 
fore  to  repress  or  to  stifle  the  ulterior  effect  of  a 
right  and  respondent  sensibility.  What  makes 
this  the  more  imperative  is,  that,  in  theology, 
right  emotions  are  in  truth  the  terminating  objects 
of  the  science.  They  form  the  landing-place,  as 
it  were,  to  which  the  intellectual  process  is  but 
the  line  df  conveyance,  or  the  series  of  stepping- 
stones.  The  reasoning  stands  to  the  sentiment 
but  in  the  relation  of  means  to  an  end — essential, 
we  must  admit,  but  still  only  essential  in  the  way 
of  subserviency;  and  that  to  something  as  much 
higher  and  nobler  than  itself,  as  the  final  result  of 
any  process  is  a  greater  and  more  estimable  thing, 
than  all  of  a  preparatory  or  merely  instrumental 
character  which  went  before  it.  It  is  just  as  if 
on  the  ulterior  margin  of  a  forest,  a  certain  spot 
or  eminence  had  to  be  gained,  that  we  might  deli¬ 
ciously  regale  ourselves  in  the  view  of  some  glori¬ 
ous  panorama  beyond  it.  In  guiding  our  way 
through  the  intricacies  of  the  approach,  the  reason¬ 
ing  faculties  of  the  mind  are  kept  in  continual 
exercise — a  succession  of  intellectual  states  may 
have  to  be  gone  through — a  busy  observation  must 
be  had  of  directions  and  distances — an  instrument 
of  observation,  the  pocket  compass,  -may  need 
perhaps  to  be  ever  and  anon  consulted — and  many 
obstructions  to  be  with  much  labour  overcome  ; 
and  all  for  the  final  enjoyment,  the  luxury  of  a 
tasteful  emotion.  And  it  is  just  with  a  sight  in 
the  moral,  as  with  a  sight  in  the  material  landscape 
To  obtain  the  sight,  much  labour  may  be  requisite, 
and  labour  of  the  intellect  too.  The  first  call  is 


126 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


upon  the  understanding,  that,  under  its  direction, 
we  may  be  conducted  to  the  actual  view  of  those 
objects  which  bring  the  appropriate  emotions  of, 
the  heart  into  play.  We  must  see  aright,  ere  we 
can  feel  aright.  If  the  object  in  question  lie 
somewhere  on  the  field  of  revelation,  we  may  in 
all  likelihood  have  to  pioneer  our  way  to  it  through 
a  succession  of  scripture  passages,  the  meaning 
of  which  we  shall  have  to  ascertain — we  may  have 
to  take  the  lights  of  criticism  for  our  guide, 
the  lexicon  let  us  say  for  our  instrument  of  dis¬ 
covery — we  may  have  to  travel  through  the  oppo¬ 
sition  of  many  heresies — and,  by  dint  of  argument 
and  comparison  and  trains  of  inference,  which, 
after  all,  are  but  the  expedients  of  a  limited  crea¬ 
ture  for  supplementing  the  defect  of  his  faculties, 
we  may  come  to  see  laboriously  and  at  length, 
that  which  a  seraph  sees  by  immediate  intuition. 
The  object  thus  ascertained,  and  presented  by 
doctrinal  theology  to  our  view,  may  be  a  radiance 
of  the  divine  perfections.  It  may  be  the  harmony 
of  truth  and  justice  with  the  freest  exercise  of 
mercy.  It  may  be  the  face  of  God  in  Christ 
reconciling  the  world,  on  which  there  sitteth  a  halo 
of  all  the  attributes — and,  more  especially,  the 
blended  love  and  holiness  of  the  Godhead.  It 
may  be  that  very  spectacle,  which,  when  seen  in 
celestial  brightness  by  celestial  eyes,  causes  the 
high  arches  of  heaven  to  ring  with  unceasing 
jubilee.  This  sight  is  beheld  on  earth,  through  a 
duller  medium  and  by  duller  optics — yet  is  only 
presented  for  the  sake  of  that  sensibility  which  it 
is  fitted  to  awaken.  The  critical  or  intellectual 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


127 


or  judging  process  by  which  we  have  obtained  it, 
stands  related  to  the  consequent  emotion,  just  as 
a  transition  does  to  a  landing-place,  he  emo¬ 
tion  is  the  terminus  ad  quern — and  when  that 
system  which  has  usurped  the  name  of  “  Rational 
Theology,”  forbids  emotion,  it  mocks  and  nullifies 
the  meaning  of  all  those  prior  mental  exercises  on 
which  its  claim  to  exclusive  rationality  is  founded. 
If  man  have  been  enabled  here,  in  his  measure 
and  according  to  his  capacity,  to  see  as  a  seraph — 
it  is  that,  in  the  same  measure  and  according  to  the 
same  capacity,  he  may  feel  as  a  seraph — may  feel 
seraphic  love  and  have  the  foretaste  of  seraphic 
ecstasies. 

23.  I'heology  is  a  science  of  which  the  know¬ 
ledge  is  indispensable  ;  but  its  own  doctrine  is, 
that  charity  or  love  is  greater  than  knowledge — 
and  therefore  let  us  never  forget  the  place  and  the 
pre-eminence  which  should  be  given  to  the  emotions 
in  theology.  If  knowledge  have  the  priority  in 
time,  or  in  the  order  of  acquisition,  aflection  has 
the  priority  in  point  of  ultimate  and  enduring  im¬ 
portance.  All  we  demand  of  the  rational  theo¬ 
logian  is,  that  when  we  see  an  object  to  be  vener¬ 
able,  we  shall  be  permitted  to  feel  and  to  express 
veneration — and,  in  general,  that,  whatever  the 
property  may  be,  whether  of  a  moral  or  a  tasteful 
or  a  pathetic  description,  that  we  shall  be  suitably 
aflected,  and  show  ourselves  to  be  suitably  affected 
therewith.  After  all,  they  who  would  treat  theo¬ 
logy  as  if  it  were  made  up  of  nothing  else  but 
jejune  abstractions,  are  but  dealing  with  the  terms, 
with  the  mere  nominalities  of  the  science,  and  not 


128 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS. 


with  the  living  truths  of  it.  The  thing  which  they 
profess  to  contemplate,  is  not  seen  by  them  in  the 
fulness  of  its  properties — and  the  whole  fabric  of 
their  orthodoxy,  as  if  made  up  of  the  dry  bones  in 
the  vision  of  Ezekiel,  wants  the  integuments  of 
skin  and  muscle,  and  above  all  that  vivifying 
spirit  which  gives  lustre  and  animation  to  the 
whole.  These  are  the  men,  whose  whole  demand 
is  for  the  bare  osteology  of  argument — and  who 
complain  that  they  are  dazzled  into  blindness, 
when  any  brightness  or  beauty  of  colouring  is 
superadded — although  a  colour  not  laid  on  by  the 
pencil  of  the  artist,  but  natively  and  originally  in 
the  subject  matter  that  he  is  handling.  Blind 
they  undoubtedly  are,  for  the  most  important,  the 
most  affecting  characteristics  in  the  object  of  their 
contemplation  have  escaped  their  notice — and  that 
very  technology  of  the  science  which  they  can  use 
so  dexterously,  is  with  them  but  a  pompous  dis¬ 
guise  to  their  own  poverty  of  conception.  They 
are  conversant  with  names ;  but  not,  by  direct 
vision,  with  the  gracefulness  or  the  glory  of  their 
archetypes — and  we  do  shrewdly  suspect,  that,  in 
this  demand  for  what  they  call  the  didactic,  and  in 
this  dread  or  distaste  for  what  they  call  the  de¬ 
clamatory,  there  is  just  an  appetite  for  every  thing 
being  flattened  to  their  own  comfortable  level,  and 
for  all  men  being  as  frigid  and  heavy  as  them¬ 
selves. 

24.  Theology,  to  be  fully  rendered,  must  be 
ardent  and  feeling  as  well  as  intellectual ;  and  its 
students  must  bear  to  be  told  of  the  grandeur  of  the 
science,  of  all  that  is  sublime  or  graceful  or  affect- 


ON  THE  EMOTIONS.  . 


129 


ing  in  the  objects  which  it  reveals,  of  its  stupen¬ 
dous  interests,  the  magnificence  of  its  reach  from 
everlasting  to  everlasting,  its  paramount  claims  to 
the  reverence  and  presiding  place  which  it  holds 
over  the  destinies  of  our  species.  It  is  the  natural, 
and  we  believe  the  almost  constant  practice  of  every 
instructor,  to  expatiate  on  the  great  worth,  if  not 
the  superiority  of  his  own  assigned  portion  in  the 
encyclopedia  of  human  knowledge — so  that  at  the 
opening  of  every  academic  course,  the  student,  in 
passing  from  one  introductory  lecture  to  another, 
may,  amid  the  high-coloured  eulogies  which  are 
pronounced  upon  all  the  sciences,  be  at  a  loss  how 
to  assign  the  rank  and  the  precedency  of  each  of 
them.  But,  in  this  conflict  of  pretensions,  it  can¬ 
not  be  that  Theology  shall  suffer  degradation — for 
whatever  is  said  or  imagined  in  behalf  of  any  other 
of  the  sciences,  but  serves  to  uphold  the  more 
that  pre-eminence  which  belongs  to  her.  Theirs 
is  derivative  glory — while  her  high  station  is  at 
that  primeval  fountain-head, whence  have  emanated 
all  those  wonders  of  truth  and  nature,  which  it  is 
the  proud  office  of  philosophy  to  investigate.  Each 
new  discovery  is  but  a  new  trophy  to  the  great¬ 
ness  of  Him  with  whom  we  have  to  do — and 
when  entering  upon  the  study  of  theology,  rich  in 
the  spoils  of  all  the  sciences,  we  should  feel  it 
impossible  to  have  any  overweening  estimate  of 
a  theme,  which  reaches  upward  to  the  high  autho¬ 
rity  of  Heaven,  and  forward  to  the  destinies  of 
our  immortal  nature. 

F  2 


130 


COMMAND  WHICH  THE  WILL 


CHAPTER  IV. 

On  the  Command  which  the  Will  has  over  the 

Emotions. 


1.  There  are  certain  denominations  which  are 
very  current  in  the  writings  of  moralists — and 
which  when  explained,  may  convince  us  how  wide 
a  range  the  emotions  have  in  the  Philosophy  of 
our  nature.  Correlated  to  the  emotions  are  the 
“appetites” — that  stand  distinguished  however  from 
our  other  desires  by  the  immediate  origin  which 
they  have  in  the  body.  Hunger  is' one  example 
of  an  appetite — thirst  is  another — and  it  is  evident 
that  if  this  be  admitted  as  the  specifying  charac¬ 
teristic  of  an  appetite,  there  are  many  subordinate 
ones  both  natural  and  acquired  which  are  chiefly 
connected  however  with  the  corporeal  organ  of 
taste — such  as  an  appetite  for  sugar  or  tobacco 
or  the  intoxicating  liquors.* 

2.  There  is  another  term  however  which  stands 
closely  related  to  the  emotions,  and  is  expressive 

*  “  Each  tree. 

Laden  with  fairest  fruit  that  hung  to  the  eye. 

Tempting  stirred  in  me  sudden  appetite, 

To  pluck  and  e.at.” — Milton,  X. 

But,  as  we  shall  afterwards  more  particularly  remark,  we  can¬ 
not  restrain  language  within  tlie  boundaries  of  definition.  And 
as  appetite  is  expressive  of  one  species  of  inclination  that  is  often 
very  strong  and  urgent — so  it  has  been  extended  from  this  prim¬ 
ary  to  other  inclinations  also  strong  and  urgent,  but  not  taking 
their  rise  in  the  body.  One  of  the  most  correct  and  classi¬ 
cal  of  cur  writers.  Dean  Swift,  says  of  power — “  That  being 
the  natural  appetite  of  princes,  a  limited  monarch  cannot  gratify 
it.” 


HAS  OVER  THE  EMOTIONS. 


131 


of  that  which  occupies  a  very  large  department  of 
our  nature — “  aiFection.’'  It  will  be  observed  that 
an  emotion  is  just  one  phenomenon — as  when 
because  of  his  engaging  manners,  or  something 
amiable  in  his  countenance  or  his  tones,  I  feel  a 
movement  of  kindness  towards  a  person  who 
perhaps  hath  been  introduced  to  my  notice  for  the 
first  time  ;  whom  I  might  never  again  meet  with  ; 
and  who  even  might  not  once  more  occur  to  my 
recollection.  But  if  these  emotions  were  to  be 
oft  repeated,  either  on  his  frequent  reappearance 
in  my  society,  or  on  his  frequent  recalment  to  my 
thoughts — then  I  should  refer  them  to  one  prin¬ 
ciple,  or  reduce  them  all  to  one  summary  expres¬ 
sion,  by  simply  stating  that  I  had  an  affection  for 
the  individual  in  question.  The  term  Emotion  is 
applied  to  each  of  the  distinct  and  repeated  feelings 
of  kindness  towards  him,  wherewith  I  ever  have 
been  visited.  The  term  Affection  denotes  the 
aptitude  or  tendency  which  there  is  in  my  mind  ; 
and  in  virtue  of  which  I  have  those  emotions 
towards  the  object  of  them.  The  term  affection 
then  suggests  no  phenomena  additional  to  those 
of  the  emotions — It  only  names  one  or  more 
classes  of  them — and  we  think  is  most  frequently 
applied  in  those  cases,  where  the  object  is  a  sentient 
creature  apart  from  ourselves — and  so  we  may 
have  an  affection  of  regard  for  one  acquaintance, 
and  an  opposite  affection  even  that  of  dislike  for 
another.  Hence  the  benevolent  and  the  malevo¬ 
lent  affections — the  objects  of  which  are  properly 
our  fellow-beings ;  and  we  should  feel  as  if  it  would 
have  helped  to  distinguish  more  accurately  things  that 


132 


COMMAND  WHICH  THE  WILL 


are  distinct,  had  the  term  not  been  attached  to  any 
thing  else— did  we  not  say  for  example  that  we  had 
an  affection  for  some  particular  food,  or  that  we  had 
an  affection  for  science,  or  an  affection  for  scenery.* 
3.  But  again  neither  would  the  term  appetite 
assort  very  well  with  science  or  with  scenery;  and 
there  is  a  class  of  emotions  which  have  each  of 
these  for  their  object,  and  a  peculiar  susceptibility 
to  which  emotions  has  perhaps  from  the  resources 
of  our  language,  obtained  some  other  denomina¬ 
tion  ;  and  accordingly  a  very  extensive  use  has  been 
made  of  the  word  Taste — and  we  may  say  in  lan- 


*  Certain  it  is  however  that  it  is  frequently  so  applied.  The 
best  English  writers  will  speak,  for  example,  of  their  affection  to 
a  cause.  We  have  the  example  of  its  extended  application  in 
scripture,  where  we  are  called  “  to  set  our  affections  on  the  things 
that  are  above,”  and  to  set  them  not  on  the  things  that  are  beneath. 
The  greatest  of  our  dranvatic  poets  evidently  applies  the  term  to 
our  desires  of  evil  towards  others  in  the  following  passage : — 

“  The  man  that  hath  no  music  in  himself 
Nor  is  not  moved  with  concord  of  sweet  sounds, 

Is  fit  for  treasons,  stratagems,  and  spoils. 

The  motions  of  his  spirit  are  dull  as  night. 

And  his  affections  dark  as  Erebus, 

Let  no  such  man  be  trusted.” 

Affection  is  often  used  in  a  very  general  sense  indeed,  so  as  to 
denote  quality  or  property — so  that,  instead  of  that  warm  and 
kindly  thing  to  which  it  is  commonly  applied,  it  is  made  to  ex¬ 
press  as  cold  and  abstract  and  metaphysical  an  idea  as  can  well 
be  imagined.  It  is  even  applied  to  mathematics.  “  The  cer¬ 
tainty  and  accurateness  which  is  attributed  to  what  mathema¬ 
ticians  deliver,  must  be  restrained  to  what  they  teach  concerning 
those  purely  mathematical  disciplines  Algebra  and  Geometry, 
where  the  affections  of  quantity  are  abstractedly  considered.” — . 
Boyle.  Here  it  signifies  the  mere  relations  in  which  quantities 
stand  to  each  other ;  and  so  it  also  signifies  the  relations,  in  re¬ 
gard  to  influence,  which  any  one  substance  in  nature  has  to 
another.  Let  it  not  be  wondered  at  then  that  when  expressing 
the  influence  which  certain  objects  have  upon  the  mind,  it  should 
bear  a  less  vivid  application  and  only  represent  the  more  mode¬ 
rate  degrees  of  emotion. 


HAS  OVER  THE  EMOTIONS. 


133 


guage  which  is  recognised  of  one  man  that  he  has 
a  great  taste  for  landscape,  and  of  another  that  he 
has  a  great  taste  for  music,  and  of  a  third  that 
he  has  a  great  taste  for  the  mathematics.  This 
term  indeed  has  diffused  itself  over  all  definable 
boundaries — and  there  is  nought  more  current  in 
conversation  than  a  taste  for  society,  and  a  taste 
for  retirement,  and  a  taste  for  agriculture.  It  may 
be  said  in  the  general  to  be  more  commonly  ap¬ 
plied  to  the  pursuits  of  life,  or  to  inanimate  objects 
— whereas  affection  centres  more  upon  those  who 
have  life  and  sensibility  like  ourselves.  We  are 
not  to  imagine,  however,  from  all  these  explana¬ 
tions,  that,  when  philosophy  multiplies  her  terms, 
she  is  therefore  multiplying  her  truths.  We  have 
not,  saving  in  our  observations  upon  appetite,  gone 
a  single  footstep  beyond  the  field  of  our  emotions ; 
and,  without  adding  one  other  fact  or  phenomenon 
to  their  previous  stock,  we  have  simply  told  how 
it  is  that  they  are  sometimes  arranged  into  classes, 
and  what  the  titles  be  which  are  sometimes  be¬ 
stowed  upon  them. 

4.  There  is  one  term  which  might  be  applied 
alike,  to  all  the  emotions  —  sensibility — and  it 
simply  marks  the  degree  in  which  we  are  alive  to 
them.  He  who  has  the  most  of  gratitude,  has  the 
greatest  sensibility  to  a  favour ;  and  the  most  of 
anger,  the  greatest  sensibility  to  a  provocation ; 
and  the  most  of  pride,  the  greatest  sensibility  to 
an  affront ;  and  the  most  of  rapture  in  the  contem- 
nlation  of  beauty,  the  greatest  sensibility  to  its 
charms.  A  sensible  man  is  by  common  usage 
tantamount  to  an  intelligent  man — else  it  might 


134 


COMMAND  WHICH  THE  WILL 


have  very  conveniently  designed  the  man  who  was 
easily  excited  by  the  objects  of  emotion.  This  is 
not  adequately  expressed  by  sensitive,  which  rather 
is  restricted  to  one  that  is  keenly  and  sensitively 
awake  to  what  is  painful  or  disgusting — as  to  the 
man  who  is  very  sensitive  about  his  importance, 
and  very  fearful  of  its  being  in  any  w'ay  trenched 
upon.  Even  the  man  who  is  more  alive  to  bodily 
pain  is  said  to  be  more  sensitive  than  another — ■ 
and  he  who  is  most  alive  to  bodily  pleasures  and 
indulges  in  them  accordingly,  as  for  example  in 
the  pleasures  of  the  table,  is  said  to  be  sensual. 

5.  But  we  must  hasten  on  this  work  of  verbal 
explanation,  although  it  is  of  consequence  too — . 
for,  though  it  supplies  us  with  no  new  facts  or 
principles  in  the  philosophy  of  mind,  it  may  at 
least  save  us  from  the  bewildering  imagination, 
that  we  have  to  look  for  something  new  of  which 
we  are  yet  ignorant  when  we  happen  to  hear  of  a 
new  term.  For  instance,  we  may  think  that  the 
passions  of  the  mind  must  require  a  distinct  and 
separate  treatment;  and  that,  when  entering  on 
the  consideration  of  them,  we  enter  on  another 
department  of  our  nature.  But  the  truth  is  that 
a  passion  differs  from  an  affection  or  a  taste,  only 
in  the  degree  of  its  strength  or  its  violence — and 
it  no  more  than  marks  the  greater  intensity  of 
those  emotions  which  are  comprehended  under  the 
general  term.  The  affection  of  love  may  be 
heightened  into  a  passion,  and  so  may  that  of 
hatred.  Anger  that  most  stormy  and  blustering  of 
ail  tiie  emotions,  had  at  one  time  from  that  circum¬ 
stance  an  almost  exclusive  monopoly  of  the  term 


HAS  OVER  THE  EMOTIONS. 


135 


— so  that  to  be  in  a  passion  is  even  still  just 
equivalent  to  being  angry — and  he  who  is  very 
susceptible  of  this  feeling,  is  denominated  a  very 
passionate  man.  But  now  that  there  is  a  great 
deal  more  than  their  w'ont  of  latitude  and  adven¬ 
ture  in  language,  the  term  is  extended  to  all  the 
emotions  when  carried  to  a  certain  degree  of 
intensity  or  violence  ;  and  it  is  held  no  impropriety 
now  to  speak  of  a  passion  for  the  arts,  of  a  passion 
for  the  theatre,  of  a  passion  for  scenery,  of  a  passion 
for  mathematics,  of  a  passion  in  short  for  any  thing 
to  the  pursuit  of  which  we  abandon  ourselves  in  full 
delight  and  with  the  devotion  of  all  our  energies.* 
6.  And  after  having  attempted  these  various 
eclaircissemens  on  the  meaning  of  words,  we  may 
here  assert  that  there  is  nothing  which  shifts,  if 
we  may  be  allowed  the  expression,  nothing  which 
shifts  so  waywardly  and  so  uncontrollably  as  lan¬ 
guage.  It  takes  its  own  wilful  and  determined 
course— and  the  edicts  of  a  Professor’s  chair  are 
but  feeble  barriers  against  the  tide  and  the  omni¬ 
potence  of  custom.  And  now  that  literature  hath 
descended  and  hath  so  widely  diffused  itself  through¬ 
out  the  population— and  now  that,  instead  of 


•  “  In  loving  thou  doest  wrell,  in  passion  not, 

Wherein  true  love  consists  not.  — Hilton, 

“  Passion’s  too  tierce  to  be  in  fetters  bound 

And  Nature  flees  him  like  enchanted  ground.” — Dryden. 

“  All  the  arts  of  rhetoric,  besides  order  and  perspicuity,  only 
move  the  passion  and  thereby  mislead  the  judgment.’ — Locke. 
“  Where  statesmen  are  ruled  by  faction  and  interest,  they  can 
have  no  passion  for  the  glory  of  their  country,  nor  any  concern 
for  the  figure  it  will  make.” — Addison.  “  Abate  a  little  that 
violent  passion  for  fine  clothes  so  predominant  in  your  sex.  — 
Swift. 


136 


COMMAND  WHICH  THE  WILL 


writing  elaborately  for  fame  in  the  retreats  of  2 
college,  the  monthly  or  even  the  daily  press  holds 
out  its  speedy  remunerations  and  hath  hired  into 
its  service  more  than  half  the  literary  talent  and 
enterprise  of  the  land,  there  is  a  sort  of  rampant 
energy  abroad  before  which  all  the  classical  and 
established  proprieties  of  academic  definition  are 
so  many  cobwebs.  Though  there  ought  to  be  a 
distinction  observed  between  all  the  terms  to  which 
we  have  just  adverted,  yet  there  is  such  an  affinity 
too  as  will  and  must  confound  the  application  of 
them.  They  are  all  expressive  of  an  inclination 
towards  certain  objects — and  this  is  enough  to 
sanction  the  indiscriminate  attachment  of  them  to 
each  and  to  every.  So  that  we  not  only  hear  of  a 
passion  for  antiquities,  but  of  a  taste  for  the  rear¬ 
ing  of  cattle,  of  an  appetite  for  rural  scenes,  and  a 
vehement  affection  for  some  rare  and  delicious 
article  of  cookery.  It  is  good  however  to  advert, 
and  perhaps  minutely  to  explain,  the  differences 
which  obtain  between  the  popular  and  philosophic 
language.  In  discriminating  words  we  are  led  to 
discriminate  more  closely  between  the  things 
whereof  they  are  expressive.  We  are  admitted  to 
a  more  just  and  intimate  discernment  of  the  interior 
of  the  subject,  and  saved  from  confounding  what 
is  really  distinct  by  some  general  and  what  to  a 
careless  and  superficial  observer  proves  a  deceiving 
similarity. 

7.  Having  now  dwelt  so  long  on  these  verbal 
criticisms,  we  feel  averse  to  any  further  explana¬ 
tions,  and  more  especially,  when  it  relates  to  a 
word  that  has  been  very  recently  introduced  into 


HAS  OVER  THE  EMOTIONS. 


137 


Mental  Science,  and  which  at  present  we  do  not 
recollect  to  have  met  with  in  the  writings  ot  him 
whom  we  regard  as  far  the  most  successful  and 
eminent  of  its  disciples — the  late  Dr.  Brown  of 
Edinburgh.  Another  ground  of  aversion  which 
we  have  to  the  term  is  that  it  sounds  scholastically; 
and  might  therefore  have,  at  least  the  apparent 
effect,  of  involving  in  the  hieroglyphical  mysticism 
of  a  strange  tongue,  that  which  ought  to  be  the 
object  of  most  familiar  and  intelligent  contempla¬ 
tion.  The  wretched  substitution  of  a  term  for  a 
truth  is  an  artifice,  by  which  the  young  student 
might  most  easily  be  imposed  upon ;  and  therefore 
as  we  have  already  said  that  we  introduced  no 
new  phenomenon  to  notice  by  the  words  which  we 
have  just  tried  to  illustrate,  but  merely  classified 
or  arranged  them  according  to  certain  of  their 
observed  characteristics — so  the  additional  term 
now  to  be  adopted  is  not  expressive  of  any  one  fact 
or  phenomenon  beyond  the  territory  of  our  sensa¬ 
tions  and  emotions ;  but  is  simply  expressive  of  an 
attribute  that  is  common  to  them  all. 

8.  It  is  Pathology — a  term  used  in  medicine, 
but  only  imported  of  late,  and  as  yet  very  little 
used  in  mental  science.  Neither  has  it  analogous 
meanings  in  these  two  applications ;  for,  in  medi¬ 
cine,  it  is  defined  to  be  that  part  of  it  which  relates 
to  the  distempers  with  their  differences  causes  and 
effects  incident  to  the  human  body — whereas  mental 
pathology  has  been  called  the  study  or  the  know¬ 
ledge  of  sensations,  of  affections,  of  passions,  and 
of  their  effects  upon  happiness. 

9.  The  intellectual  states  of  the  mind,  and  its 


138 


COMMAND  WHICH  THE  WILL 


states  of  emotion,  belong  to  distinct  provinces  of 
the  mental  constitution — the  former  to  the  perci¬ 
pient,  and  the  latter  to  what  Sir  James  Mackintosh 
would  term  the  emotive  or  pathematic  part  of  our 
nature.  Bentham  applies  the  term  pathology  to 
the  mind  in  somewhat  the  same  sense — not  ex¬ 
pressive  as  in  medical  science,  of  states  of  dis¬ 
ease,  under  which  the  body  suffers ;  but  expres¬ 
sive  in  mental  science,  of  states  of  susceptibility, 
under  which  the  mind  is  in  any  way  affected, 
whether  painfully  or  pleasurably.  Had  it  not 
been  for  the  previous  usurpation  or  engagement  of 
this  term  by  medical  writers,  who  restrict  the 
application  of  it  to  the  distempers  of  our  corporeal 
frame,  it  might  have  been  conveniently  extended 
to  all  the  susceptibilities  of  the  mental  constitu¬ 
tion — even  when  that  constitution  is  in  its  health¬ 
ful  and  natural  state.  According  to  the  medical 
use  of  it  the  Greek  ’Traffyji},  from  which  it  is  de¬ 
rived  is  understood  in  the  sense  of  the  Latin 
translation  patior  to  suffer.  According  to  the 
sense  which  we  now  propose  for  it,  in  treating  of 
mental  phenomena,  the  Greek  would  be 

understood  in  the  sense  of  the  Latin  translation 
afficior,  to  be  affected.  When  treating  of  the 
mental  pathology  wm  treat,  not  of  mental  suffer¬ 
ings,  but  more  generally  of  mental  susceptibilities. 
The  of  the  Greek,  whence  the  lerm  comes, 

is  equivalent  either  to  the  ^’"patior”  or  the  “  affici¬ 
or”  of  Latin, — the  former  signifying  “  to  suffer,” 
and  the  latter  simply  “  to  be  affected” — the  former 
sense  being  the  one  that  is  retained  in  medical, 
and  the  latter  in  mental  pathology.  The  two 


HAS  OVER  THE  EMOTIONS. 


139 


differ  as  much  the  one  from  the  other,  as  passion 
does  from  affection,  or  the  violence  of  a  distem¬ 
per  does  from  the  due  and  pacific  effect  of  a 
natural  influence.  Even  the  Latin  patior" 
might  be  translated,  not  merely  into  suffer,  but 
into  “  the  being  acted  upon”  or  into  “  the  being 
passive.”  Medical  pathology  is  the  study  of 
those  diseases  under  which  the  body  suffers. 
Mental  pathology  is  the  study  of  all  those  pheno¬ 
mena  that  arise  from  influences  acting  upon  the 
mind  view'ed  as  passive,  or  as  not  putting  forth 
any  choice  or  activity  at  the  time.  Now,  when 
thus  defined,  it  will  embrace  all  that  we  under¬ 
stand  by  sensations,  and  affections,  and  passions. 
It  is  not  of  my  will  that  certain  colours  impress 
their  appropriate  sensations  upon  my  eye,  or  that 
certain  sounds  impress  their  sensations  upon  my 
ear.  It  is  not  of  my  w^ill,  but  of  an  organization 
which  I  often  cannot  help,  that  I  am  so  nervously 
irritable  under  certain  disagreeable  sights  and  dis¬ 
agreeable  noises.  It  is  not  of  my  will,  but  of  an 
aggressive  influence  which  I  cannot  withstand,  that, 
when  placed  on  an  airy  summit,  I  forthwith  swim 
in  giddiness,  and  am  seized  with  the  imagination, 
that  if  I  turn  not  my  feet  and  my  eyes  from  the 
frightful  precipice’s  margin,  I  shall  topple  to  its 
base.  Neither  is  it  of  my  will  that  I  am  visited 
with  such  ineffable  disgust  at  the  sight  of  some 
loathsome  animal.  But  these  are  strong  instances, 
and  perhaps  evince  a  state  bordering  on  disease. 
Yet  we  may  gather  from  them  some  general  con¬ 
ception  of  what  is  meant  by  mental  pathology, 
whose  design  it  is  to  set  forth  all  those  states  of 


140 


COMMAND  WHICH  THE  WILL 


feeling  into  which  the  mind  is  thrown,  by  the 
influence  of  those  various  objects  that  are  fitted  to 
excite  either  the  emotions  or  the  sensitive  affec¬ 
tions  of  our  nature.  And,  to  keep  the  subject  of 
mental  pathology  pure,  we  shall  suppose  these 
states  of  feeling  to  be  altogether  unmodified  by 
the  will,  and  to  be  the  very  states  which  result 
from  the  law  of  the  external  senses,  or  the  laws  of 
emotion,  operating  upon  us  at  the  time  when  the 
mind  is  either  wholly  powerless  or  wholly  inactive. 
To  be  furnished  with  one  comprehensive  term  by 
which  to  impress  a  mark  on  so  large  an  order  of 
phenomena  must  he  found  very  commodious ;  and 
though  we  have  adverted  to  the  etymology  of  the 
term,  yet,  in  truth,  it  is  of  no  consequence  whether 
the  process  of  derivation  be  accurate  or  not — seeing 
that  the  most  arbitrary  definition,  if  it  only  be  pre¬ 
cise  in  its  objects,  and  have  a  precisely  expressed 
sense  affixed  to  it,  can  serve  all  the  purposes  for 
which  a  definition  is  desirable. 

10.  Grant  that  the  eye  is  open,  and  that  some 
visible  object  of  given  dimensions  and  a  given  hue 
is  set  before  it ;  and  the  sensation  impressed 
thereby  is  just  as  involuntary  as  the  circulation  of 
the  blood.  This  is  a  case  of  pure  pathology,  and 
that  just  because  it  is  involuntary — the  will  being 
either  wholly  inert  or  wholly  unable.  It  either 
puts  forth  no  choice  in  the  matter,  or  if  it  do,  it  is 
of  that  impotency  that  it  is  and  can  be  followed  up 
by  no  act  or  no  execution.  It  is  true,  that  if  he 
will  he  may  shut  his  eye,  and  thus  make  his 
escape  from  the  pathology.  But  so  long  as  the 
eye  is  open,  he  cannot  alter  it  however  much  he 


HAS  OVER  THE  EMOTIONS. 


141 


would.  And  at  his  will  too,  he  may  interpose  a 
coloured  glass  between  him  and  the  object — and 
dius  blend  his  volitions  with  all  the  other  influences 
that  have  had  effect  upon  the  resulting  sensation 
in  the  retina  of  the  eye.  Yet  there  is  no  difficulty 
here  in  discriminating  between  the  voluntary  and 
the  strictly  pathological,  between  the  share  which 
the  mind’s  activity  hath  had  in  the  ultimate  effect, 
and  the  share  that  hath  as  it  were  been  forced 
upon  the  mind  by  the  laws  of  sensation,  and  under 
the  operation  of  which  laws  the  mind  is  passive  or 
at  least  altogether  powerless.  Had  it  not  been 
for  the  forth-putting  of  authority  on  the  part  of 
the  mind,  there  would  have  been  no  use  of  the 
coloured  glass ;  and  so  the  impression  upon  the 
senses  has  been  modified  by  an  act  of  choice  into 
a  something  different  from  what  it  would  have  been, 
had  the  eye  simply  looked  out  on  the  natural 
prospect  before  it.  But  after  that  the  glass  has 
been  set  up,  and  the  eye  of  the  observer  looks 
through  it  on  the  ulterior  field  of  contemplation, 
there  may  have  been  choice  and  activity  in  thus 
assembling  together  all  the  circumstances  under 
which  the  observation  is  made;  but,  after  having 
proceeded  thus  far,  there  is  just  as  much  of  pure 
pathology  in  the  resulting  impression,  as  there  was 
when  the  eye  looked  nakedly  on  the  scene.  The 
man  can  no  more  help  or  modify  the  resulting 
sensation  in  the  new  circumstances,  than  he  could 
in  the  old.  The  now  tinged  and  transformed 
colour  of  the  landscape  is  just  as  necessarily  the 
result  of  the  artificial  medium  through  which  it  is 
contemplated,  as  its  natural  colour  is  the  result  ot 


142 


COMMAND  WHICH  THE  WILL 


the  atmospherical  medium ;  and  we  can  be  at  no 
loss,  w'e  repeat  it,  to  distinguish  here  the  share 
which  the  active  or  voluntary  hath  had  in  the  final 
effect,  and  the  share  which  the  passive  or  the 
pathological  hath  had  in  it. 

11.  Now  though  we  cannot  assign  the  limit  in 
every  other  case,  that  is  not  to  say  but  that  in  every 
case  such  a  limit  does  exist.  In  the  emotions  of 
taste,  for  example,  when  the  mind  resigns  itself  to 
the  impression  of  all  those  beauties  which  stand 
revealed  to  its  gaze,  there  is  a  pure  operation  of 
pathology  going  on.  We  can  imagine  a  traveller 
who  has  been  enamoured  with  a  scene,  of  whose 
history  he  at  the  time  was  ignorant ;  and  in  the 
process  of  being  touched  by  the  loveliness  of  its 
features,  or  of  being  arrested  and  solemnized  by 
its  grandeur,  there  might  just  take  place  the  very 
same  pathological  operation  that  is  exemplified  in 
all  similar  and  ordinary  contemplations.  But  let 
him  be  told  in  the  evening,  that  if  he  would  take 
the  trouble  of  consulting  his  guide,  he  should  be 
informed  of  that  which,  did  he  again  look  to  this 
very  landscape  on  the  morrow,  would  greatly 
enhance  or  modify  all  the  emotions  wherewith  he 
had  already  regarded  it.  There  are  a  will  and 
an  activity  on  his  part  concerned  in  the  w^ork  of 
consultation ;  and  let  the  fruit  of  it  be,  that  he 
now  has  learned  of  the  scene  that  it  is  the  plain  of 
Marathon  or  the  no  less  celebrated  Thermopylae ; 
and  mark  the  new  interest  and  glory  which  so 
noble  an  association  would  pour  over  it.  With 
such  a  consciousness  that  he  wanted  yesterday, 
but  which  is  now  present,  he  looks  on  the  pro- 


HAS  OVER  THE  EMOTIONS, 


143 


spect  before  him  through  a  medium  that  heightens 
every  tint,  and  that  gives  a  moral  and  a  fiterary 
lustre  even  to  its  most  ordinary  details.  It  is 
true  that  it  is  in  virtue  of  a  something  which  he 
voluntarily  did  that  he  now  looks  upon  the  scene,  not 
in  its  own  naked  characteristics,  but  through  the 
exalting  transparency  of  many  classical  and  many 
patriotic  recollections — but  after  that  these  recol¬ 
lections  have  been  thus  gotten  up,  all  the  active 
powers  lie  suspended  amid  the  raptures  of  a  vision 
that  has  thus  been  glorified — and  every  ecstasy 
that  comes  upon  his  soul,  while  he  gazes  upon 
that  which  is  now  transformed  into  a  scene  of 
enchantment,  is  the  fruit  of  a  process  that  is 
wholly  pathological. 

12.  And  we  can  further  perceive,  how  in  the 
course  of  this  enjoyment,  the  voluntary  and  the 
pathological  might  be  so  intermixed  as  to  alternate 
with  each  other.  It  is  the  pleasurable  sensation 
that  gives  him  the  will  to  vary  and  to  perpetuate 
it — and  it  is  at  the  bidding  of  his  will  that  he  trans¬ 
ports  himself  from  one  point  of  view  to  another ;  and 
that,  to  prolong  or  to  enhance  or  to  diversify  the 
sensation.  We  see  from  this  how  there  is  a  dis¬ 
tinction  between  the  two  states  of  the  mind — that 
m  which  it  acts  as  a  commander  over  the  measures 
and  the  movements  of  him  whom  it  animates,  and 
that  in  which  it  is  the  passive  recipient  of  the  in¬ 
fluences  by  which  it  is  surrounded.  By  these 
measures  or  movements,  on  the  one  hand,  he  may 
be  translated  into  the  right  condition  for  being 
operated  upon  by  certain  influences ;  and  in  this 
condition,  on  the  other,  he  may  be  the  passive 


144 


COMMAND  WHICH  THE  WILL 


subject  of  these  influences.  It  may  be  in  virtue 
of  his  will,  and  by  the  laborious  execution  of  its 
dictates,  that  he  first  became  acquainted  with  all 
the  localities  of  Marathon ;  and  then  ascended  the 
peak  whence  the  eye  could  best  expatiate  over  the 
field  of  a  nation’s  proudest  achievement.  But 
when  there,  the  character  of  the  scene  that  is 
before  him,  with  all  its  awakened  imagery  of  Greek 
and  classic  story,  finds  resistless  way  into  his 
soul ;  his  will  lies  prostrate  under  the  visions  and 
reveries  that  lord  it  over  him,  or  rather  he  be¬ 
comes  the  willing,  because  the  delighted  subject 
of  a  most  delightful  fascination. 

13.  Now  what  we  should  especially  remark  is, 
that,  though  the  voluntary  and  pathological  parts 
of  our  constitution  are  wholly  distinct  the  one  from 
the  other,  when  regarded  as  separate  objects  of 
contemplation  ;  yet,  when  viewed  as  the  parts  of  a 
historical  succession,  they  are  very  closely  allied  in 
the  way  of  cause  and  of  consequence.  It  is  thus  in 
fact  that  the  emotions  and  the  sensitive  affections  are 
the  great  principles  of  action.  It  is  to  attain  the 
objects  of  them,  that  all  the  human  activities  are  set 
agoing — and  thus  it  is  that,  on  a  simple  difference 
in  the  degrees  and  the  kinds  of  that  emotion  or 
sensitive  affection  whereof  men  are  susceptible, 
might  we  explain  all  those  countless  varieties  of 
mental  habit  and  complexion  which  obtain  in  our 
species.  It  is  because  of  this,  that  one  man  more 
alive  than  his  fellow  to  the  pleasures  of  appetite, 
will  not  only  give  himself  over  to  their  indulgence, 
but  will  prosecute  a  busy  train  of  devices  and 
doings  on  purpose  to  obtain  them — and  another 


HAS  OVER  THE  EMOTIONS. 


145 


more  alive  to  sympathy,  will,  like  Howard,  make  a 
labour  and  a  profession  of  benevolence — and  an¬ 
other  to  the  desire  of  power,  will  embark  all  the 
longings  and  energies  of  his  soul  on  the  objects  of 
a  resistless  ambition — and  another  to  the  desire 
of  wealth,  will  compass  sea  and  land  in  the 
schemes  and  speculations  of  merchandize — and 
another  to  the  desire  of  evil  to  others,  has 
been  known  to  ply  for  years  at  the  labour  of  his 
incessant  and  infernal  politics  for  their  overthrow 
— and  another  whose  reigning  passion  is  glory, 
will  rush  among  scenes  of  hottest  w'arfare  or  climb 
the  arduous  steeps  of  philosophy  in  order  to  realize 
it.  In  all  these  instances  there  has  been  a  patho¬ 
logy  at  work,  under  w'hich  the  mind  in  one  aspect 
may  be  regarded  as  altogether  passive ;  but  the 
result  is  a  moving  force  that  summons  to  their  post 
all  the  activities  of  our  nature,  and  sends  them 
forth  on  those  multifarious  walks  of  labour  and 
enterprise  that  diversify  the  interests,  and  give 
such  a  scattered  direction  to  the  pursuits  of  human 
beings, 

14.  The  distinction  between  the  pathological 
and  the  voluntary  is  tantamount  to  the  distinction 
often  made  betw'een  a  mental  susceptibility  and  a 
mental  power.  Should  we  attempt  to  define  it, 
we  might  say  of  the  power,  that  it  implies  a  refer¬ 
ence  to  something  consequent,  and  of  the  sus¬ 
ceptibility  that  it  implies  a  reference  to  some¬ 
thing  antecedent.  It  is  thus  that  a  volition  is 
conceived  to  indicate  the  former,  and  an  emotion 
to  indicate  the  latter.  Anger  would  be  spoken 
of  rather  as  a  susceptibility  of  the  mind  than  as 

VOL.  V.  a 


146 


COMMAND  WHICH  THE  WILL 


a  power;  and  will  rather  as  a  power  than  as  a 
susceptibility.  We  view  anger  in  connexion  with 
the  provocatives  which  went  before  it ;  and  so, 
regarding  it  as  an  effect,  we  conceive  of  the  mind 
in  which  this  effect  has  been  wrought,  as  being  at 
the  time  in  a  state  of  subject  passiveness.  We 
view  the  will  in  connexion  with  the  deeds  which 
follow  on  its  determination  ;  and  so,  regarding  it 
as  a  cause,  we  conceive  of  the  mind  when  it  wills 
as  being  in  a  state  of  active  efficiency.  And  yet  a 
determination  of  the  will  may  be  viewed,  not  merely 
as  the  prior  term  to  the  act  which  flows  from  it, 
but  also  as  the  posterior  term  to  the  influence 
which  gave  it  birth — or,  in  other  words,  either  as 
the  forthgoing  of  a  power  or  as  the  result  of  a 
susceptibility.  It  is  thus  that  desire,  which,  on 
ooking  backward  to  the  cause  from  whence  it 
sprung,  we  should  call  a  susceptibility — on  looking 
forward  to  the  effort  which  it  prompts  for  the 
attainment  of  its  object,  we  should  call  an  impel¬ 
lent  ;  and  thus  depth  of  feeling  is  identical,  or  at 
least  in  immediate  contact,  with  decision  and  in¬ 
tensity  of  purpose. 

15.  The  will  may  be  spoken  of  either  as  a 
faculty  of  the  mind,  or  it  may  denote  one  separate 
and  individual  act  of  willing.  He  willed  to  take 
a  walk  with  me.  It  was  his  will  so  to  do.  But 
there  is  another  term  which  is  more  properly 
expressive  of  the  act,  and  is  not  at  all  expres¬ 
sive  of  the  faculty.  Those  terms  which  discrimi¬ 
nate,  and  which  restrict  language  to  a  special 
meaning,  are  very  convenient  both  in  science  and 
in  common  life.  The  will  then  may  express  both 


HAS  OVER  THE  EMOTIONS. 


147 


the  faculty  and  the  act  of  willing.  But  the  act  of 
willing  has  been  further  expressed  by  a  term 
appropriated  wholly  to  itself — and  that  is,  volition. 
Mr.  Locke  defines  volition  to  be  “an  act  of  the 
mind,  knowingly  exerting  that  dominion  it  takes 
itself  to  have  over  any  part  of  the  man,  by  employ¬ 
ing  it  in  or  withholding  it  from  any  particular 
action.”  And  Dr.  Reid  more  briefly,  but  to  the 
same  effect,  says,  that  it  is — “  the  determination  of 
the  mind  to  do  or  not  to  do  something  which  we 
conceive  to  be  in  our  power.”  He  very  properly 
remarks,  however,  that,  after  all,  determination  is 
only  another  word  for  volition;  and  he  excuses 
himself,  at  the  same  time,  from  giving  any  other 
more  logical  definition — on  the  plea,  that  simple 
acts  of  the  mind  do  not  admit  of  one. 

16.  There  is  certainly  a  ground,  in  the  nature 
and  actual  workings  of  the  mental  constitution, 
for  the  distinction,  which  has  been  questioned  of 
late,  between  will  and  desire.  Desire  has  thus 
been  defined  by  Locke — “  It  is  the  uneasiness 
man  finds  in  himself,  upon  the  absence  of  any  thing 
whose  present  enjoyment  carries  the  idea  of 
delight  with  it” — an  uneasiness  which  many  may 
remember  to  have  felt  in  their  younger  days,  at 
the  sight  of  an  apple  of  tempting  physiognomy, 
that  they  would  fain  have  laid  liold  of,  but  were 
restrained  from  touching  by  other  considerations. 
1  he  desire  is  just  the  liking  that  one  has  for  the 
apple ;  and  by  its  effectual  solicitations  it  may 
gain  over  the  will  to  its  side — in  which  case, 
through  the  medium  of  a  volition,  the  apple  is  laid 
hold  of,  and  turned  to  its  natural  application.  But 


t 


148  COMMAND  WHICH  THE  WILL 

the  will  may  and  often  does  refuse  its  consent; 
and  we  then  both  perceive  the  distinction  between 
the  desire  and  the  will  when  we  thus  see  them  in 
a  state  of  opposition — or  when  the  urgency  of 
the  desire  is  met  by  other  urgencies  which  restrain 
the  indulgence  of  it.  One  might  be  conceived,  as 
having  the  greatest  appetency  for  the  fruit,  and 
yet  knowing  it  to  be  injurious  to  his  health — so 
that,  however  strong  his  desires,  his  will  keeps  its 
ground  against  their  solicitations.  Or  he  may 
wish  to  reserve  it  for  one  of  his  infant  children ; 
and  so  his  will  sides  with  the  second  desire  against 
the  first,  and  carries  this  latter  one  into  execution. 
Or  he  may  reflect  after  all,  that  the  apple  is  not 
his  own  property,  or  that  perhaps  he  could  not 
pull  it  from  among  the  golden  clusters  around  it 
without  injury  to  the  tree  upon  which  it  is  hanging; 
and  so  he  is  led  by  the  sense  of  justice  to  keep 
both  the  one  and  the  other  desire  at  abeyance — 
and  the  object  of  temptation  remains  untouched, 
just  because  the  will  combats  the  desire  instead  of 
complying  with  it,  and  refuses  to  issue  that  man¬ 
date,  or  in  other  words  to  put  forth  that  volition, 
which  would  instantly  be  followed  up  by  an  act 
and  an  accomplishment.  And  thus  however  good 
the  tree  is  for  food,  and  however  pleasant  to  the 
eyes,  and  however  much  to  be  desired,  so  as  to 
make  one  taste  and  be  satisfied — yet,  if  strong 
enough  in  all  these  determinations  of  prudence  or 
principle,  he  may  look  on  the  fruit  thereof  and  not 
eat. 

17.  Dr.  Brown  and  others  would  say,  that  there 
is  nothing  in  this  process,  but  the  contest  of  oppo- 


HAS  OVER  THE  EMOTIONS 


149 


site  desires  and  the  prevalence  of  the  strongest 
one — and  so  identify  will  and  desire  with  each 
other.*  But  though  a  volition  should  be  the  sure 
result  of  a  desire,  that  is  no  more  reason  why  they 
should  be  identified,  than  why  the  prior  term  of 
any  series  in  nature  should  be  identified  or  con¬ 
founded  with  any  of  its  posterior  terms,  whether 
more  or  less  remote.  In  the  process  that  we  have 
been  describing,  there  were  different  desires  in 
play,  but  there  were  not  different  volitions  in  play. 
There  was  one  volition  appended  to  the  strongest 
desire :  but  the  other  desires  though  felt  by  the 
mind,  and  therefore  in  actual  being,  had  no  voli¬ 
tions  appended  to  them — proving  that  a  desire 
may  exist  separately  from  the  volition  that  is 

•  Edwards  at  the  outset  of  his  treatise  on  the  will  controverts 
Locke ;  but  in  such  a  way  as  reduces  the  difference  between  them 
very  much  to  a  question  of  nomenclature.  On  the  one  hand,  the 
difference  between  a  volition  and  a  desire  does  not  affect  the  main 
doctrine  of  Jonathan  Edwards ;  for  though  volitions  be  distinct 
from  desires,  they  may  nevertheless  be  the  strict  and  unvarying 
results  of  them.  Even  Edwards  himself  seems  to  admit  that  the 
mind  has  a  different  object  in  willing  from  what  it  has  in  desiring 
— an  act  of  our  own  being  the  object  of  the  one ;  the  thing 
desired  being  the  object  of  the  other.  It  serves  to  mark  more 
strikingly  the  distinction  between  willing  and  desiring,  whenever 
an  act  of  our  own  is  the  proper  object  of  each  of  them.  There 
may  be  a  great  desire  to  inflict  a  blow  on  an  offender ;  but  this 
desire  restrained  by  considerations  of  prudence  or  principle,  may 
not  pass  into  a  volition.  Edwards  would  say  that  even  here  the 
volition  does  not  run  counter  to  the  desire,  but  only  marks  the 
prevalence  of  the  stronger  desire  over  the  weaker  one.  Now 
this  is  true,  but  without  at  all  obliterating  the  distinction  for 
which  we  contend.  The  volition  does  run  counter  to  the  weaker 
desire  though  under  the  impulse  of  the  stronger,  and  there  are 
three  distinct  mental  phenomena  in  this  instance,  the  stronger 
desire,  the  weaker  desire,  and  the  volition,  which  ought  no  more 
to  be  confounded,  than  any  movement  with  the  motive  forces 
that  gave  rise  to  it,  or  than  the  posterior  with  the  prior  term  of 
any  sequence. 


150 


COMMAND  WHICH  THE  WILL 


proper  to  it,  and  that  therefore  the  two  are  sepa¬ 
rate  and  distinct  from  each  other.  The  trutli  is, 
using  Dr.  Brown’s  own  language,  the  mind  is  in 
a  different  state  when  framing  a  volition,  from 
what  it  is  when  feeling  a  desire.  When  feeling  a 
desire  the  mind  has  respect  to  the  object  desired 
— ^which  object,  then  in  view  of  the  mind,  is  acting 
with  its  own  peculiar  influence  on  a  mental  sus¬ 
ceptibility.  When  framing  a  volition  the  mind 
has  respect,  not  properly  to  the  object,  but  to 
the  act  by  which  it  shall  attain  the  object— and  so 
is  said  to  be  putting  forth  a  mental  power.*  But 
whether  this  distinction  be  accurately  expressed  or, 
not,  certain  it  is,  the  mind  is  differently  condition¬ 
ed  when  in  but  a  state  of  simple  desire — from 
what  it  is  when  in  the  act  of  conceiving  a  volition. 
It  is  engaged  with  different  things,  and  looking 
different  ways — in  the  one  case  to  the  antecedent 
object  which  has  excited  the  desire,  in  the  other 
case  to  the  posterior  act  on  which  the  will  has 
determined  for  the  attainment  of  the  object.  The 
palsied  man,  who  cannot  stretch  forth  his  hand  to 
the  apple  that  is  placed  in  the  distance  before 
him,  may  nevertheless  long  after  it ;  and  in  him 
we  perceive  desire  singly — for  he  is  restrained  by 
very  helplessness  from  putting  forth  a  volition, 
the  proper  object  of  which  is  some  action  of  our 
own,  and  that  we  know  to  be  in  our  own  powder. 
We  accept  wdth  great  pleasure  of  that  simplifica¬ 
tion  by  Dr.  Brown,  in  virtue  of  which  we  regard 
the  mind,  not  as  a  congeries  of  different  faculties. 


*  See  Art,  14.  of  this  Chapter. 


HAS  OVER  THE  EMOTIONS. 


151 


but  as  itself  one  and  indivisible,  having  the  capa¬ 
city  of  passing  into  dilFerent  states  ;  and,  without 
conceiving  any  distinction  of  faculties,  we  only 
affirm  that  it  is  in  a  different  state  when  it  wills, 
from  that  in  which  it  is  when  it  simply  desires. 
Notwithstanding  the  high  authority  both  of  Dr. 
Brown  and  Mr.  Mill,  we  think  that  in  confound¬ 
ing  these  two,  they  have  fallen  into  an  erroneous 
simplification ;  and  we  abide  by  the  distinctions  of 
Dugald  Stewart  and  the  older  writers  upon  this 
subject.* 

*  Ilunie  says  very  well  of  desire  that — “  it  arises  from  good 
considered  simply,  and  aversion  from  evil.  The  will  again  exerts 
itself,  when  either  the  presence  of  the  good  or  absence  of  the  evil 
may  be  attained  by  any  action  of  the  mind  or  body.”  This  is 
tlie  definition  of  Ilume,  and  it  is  a  very  good  one.  And  it  tallies 
with  the  sensible  remark  of  Dr.  Reid,  that  the  object  of  every 
volition  is  some  action  of  our  own.  And  upon  this  he  founds 
some  very  clear  illustrations  of  the  difference  that  there  is  l>etween 
a  desire  and  a  volition.  “  A  man  desires  that  his  children  may 
be  happv,  and  that  they  -may  behave  well.  Their  being  happy  is 
no  action  at  all  ;  and  their  behaving  well  is  not  his  action  but 
theirs.”  “  A  man  athirst  has  a  strong  desire  to  drink;  but  for 
some  particular  reason  he  determines  not  to  gratify  his  desire.’ 
Here  the  man  has  the  desire  but  not  the  will.  In  other  cases 
he  may  have  the  will  but  not  the  desire.  “  A  man  for  health 
mav  take  a  nan.seous  drug,  for  which  he  has  no  desire  but  a  great 
aversion.”  Desire,  therefore,'*  is  not  will ;  but  only  one  of  the 
incitements  that  often  leads  to  it — though  it  may  at  all  times  be, 
and  actuallv  sometimes  is  withstood.  It  is  however  because 
desire  is  so  often  accompanied  by  will,  that  we  are  apt  to  over¬ 
look  the  distinction  between  them. 

I  may  here  observe,  that  to  frame  a  volition  is  sometimes 
expressed  more  shortlv  by  the  phrase,  to  will.  I  will  to  put  forth 
my  hand,  is  different  from,  I  desire  to  put  it  forth.  There  may 
be  reasons  why  I  should  restrain  the  desire — so  that  though  I 
desire  it,  I  may  not  will  it.  For  this  application  of  the  verb  to 
will  we  have  the  authority  of  the  best  English  writers.  “  Who¬ 
ever,”  savs  Dr.  South,  “  wills  the  doing  of  a  thing,  if  the  doing 
of  it  be  in  his  power,  he  will  certainly  do  it  ;  and  whoever  does 
not  do  the  thing  which  he  has  in  his  power  to  do,  does  not  pr^ 
perly  will  it.”  And  Locke  says,  “  The  man  that  sits  still  is  said 
(o  be  at  liberty,  because  he  can  walk  if  he  wills  it.”  Dr.  Soutd 


152 


COMMAND  WHICH  THE  WILL 


18.  We  may  here  observe,  in  reference  to  the 
two  general  views  that  may  be  taken  of  the  mind,* 
that  this  last  determination  of  the  will,  or  the  act 
in  which  it  terminates,  may  be  considered,  either 
as  the  result  of  a  very  complex  ulterior  mechanism, 
or  simply  as  the  final  step  of  a  continuous  process 
that  has  been  described  by  the  mind,  as  it  passed 
from  one  state  to  another.  The  passions,  and 
alfections,  and  desires,  and  will,  and  self-love  as 
influenced  by  a  calculation  upon  health,  and  instinct 
as  prompting  to  the  gratification  of  offspring,  and 
the  moral  sense  as  recoiling  from  a  deed  of  imposi¬ 
tion — all  these  may  be  put  together  by  the  imagi¬ 
nation  as  so  many  distinct  faculties  of  mind,  and 
having  each  a  proper  and  separate  function  of  its 
own  that  evolves  itself  at  the  right  moment — and, 
in  virtue  of  all  whose  respective  parts  or  perfor¬ 
mances,  the  resulting  act  hath  fallen  out  just  as  we 
observe  it.  Or,  conformably  to  the  latter  mode 
of  conception,  the  whole  may  be  looked  to  merely 
in  the  light  of  a  succession,  that  can  be  thrown 
into  a  narrative,  whereof  the  one  uncompounded 
mind  all  the  while  is  the  one  or  the  principal  sub¬ 
ject.  On  the  moment  that  the  apple  was  seen, 
the  mind  felt  an  appetency  towards  it,  to  which, 

makes  a  happy  discrimination,  which  serves  to  throw  light  upon 
the  precise  nature  of  a  volition  as  opposed  to  other  things  that 
may  or  may  not  lead  to  a  volition — when  he  says,  “  that  there  is 
as  much  difference  between  the  approbation  of  the  judgment  and 
the  actual  volitions  of  the  will,  as  between  a  man’s  viewing  a 
desirable  thing,  and  reaching  after  it  with  his  hand.”  He  further 
says  of  a  wish,  which  is  nought  but  a  longing  desire,  that — “  a 
wish  is  properly  the  desire  of  a  man  who  is  sitting  or  lying  still ; 
but  an  act  of  the  will  is  a  man  of  business  vigorously  going  about 
his  work.” 

•  See  our  Natural  Theology,  VoL  I.  Book  III.  chap.  I.  §  3. 


HAS  OVER  THE  EMOTIONS. 


153 


had  it  yielded,  it  would  have  willed  the  eating  of 
the  apple  and  ate  of  it  accordingly.  But  between 
the  desiring  and  the  willing,  the  mind  reflected  on 
the  danger  to  which  the  bodily  health  was  exposed 
by  this  indulgence ;  or  it  thought  of  the  pleasure 
which  an  infant  child  might  have  in  this  apple ;  or 
it  adverted  to  the  circumstance  of  this  apple  being 
the  property  of  another,  and  so  to  the  wrongness 
of  making  free  with  it — in  consequence  of  which 
the  mind  kept  its  first  inclination  in  check,  and 
resolved  not  to  comply  with  it.  It  would  not  con¬ 
sent  ;  no  volition  was  issued ;  and  the  apple  was 
not  eaten. 

19.  Now  there  is  great  difficulty  in  getting 
through  the  narrative  that  is  grounded  on  the 
imagination,  not  of  the  mind  as  a  complex  machine, 
but  of  the  mind  as  a  simple  substance  and  only 
passing  onward  along  the  gradations  of  a  history — 
of  getting  through  even  this  narration,  without 
naming  substantively  the  desire,  and  the  will,  and 
the  conscience,  and  several  more  of  the  faculties  of 
our  nature.  And  one  cannot  name  them  substan¬ 
tively  without  also  a  strong  tendency  to  conceive 
of  them  substantively;  and  so  the  desires  are 
spoken  of  as  so  many  inferior  principles  of  our 
nature,  that  are  ever  plying  and  pursuing  the  will 
with  their  solicitations ;  and  this  will  is  viewed  as 
that  great  master  faculty,  in  whose  hands  the 
executive  power  hath  been  lodged,  and  without 
whose  word  of  command  issued  in  the  shape  of  a 
volition  not  an  appetite  or  desire  can  find  its  grati¬ 
fication  ;  and  then,  either  an  enlightened  self-love 
is  conceived  to  step  forward  and  urge  in  the  hear- 

a  2 


154 


COMMAND  WHICH  THE  WILD 


ing  of  the  will  its  prudential  considerations,  or 
conscience  to  lift  up  her  pleading  voice,  and  claim 
her  rightful  authority  even  over  the  will — which, 
though  the  great  organ  whereon  all  our  instruments 
of  activity  must  wait,  and  whereby  as  so  many 
servants  they  are  set  agoing,  yet  is  herself  but  an 
instrument  for  carrying  into  elfect  the  decisions  of 
conscience  that  superior  and  legislative  faculty  of 
the  mind. 

20.  Now  is  the  time  for  adverting  to  a  principle, 
which  we  have  long  regarded  as  a  chief  interme¬ 
diate  link  between  the  science  of  morals  and  the 
science  of  mind — we  mean  its  faculty  of  attention. 
We  are  confident  that  we  speak  to  the  experience 
of  all,  when  we  say  that  attention  is  a  voluntary 
act — that,  if  not  so  at  all  times,  there  are  at  least 
many  times  when  the  wall  hath  very  great  power 
over  the  direction  of  this  faculty,  and  the  degree 
of  its  exercise — that,  at  my  pleasure  in  fact,  I  can 
withdraw  and  turn  and  transfer  it  from  one  object 
to  another — and  just  in  like  manner  as  by  a  volition 
I  can  transport  my  person  to  a  given  scene,  and 
thus  bring  things  and  circumstances  under  the  eye 
of  my  senses  which  would  not  otherwise  have  fallen 
under  my  observation — so,  by  a  volition  also,  I 
can  ti'ansport  my  thinking  principle  to  a  given 
matter  of  contemplation,  and  thus  bring  under  the 
eye  of  my  mental  observation  things,  which,  but 
for  this  exercise  of  my  will,  would  not  have  been 
present  to  it.  We  are  quite  familiar  with  the 
power  of  the  human  will  over  the  human  body; 
and  how,  in  virtue  of  this,  it  may  be  explained  why 
personally  we  are  at  one  place  rather  than  at 


HAS  OVER  THE  EMOTIONS. 


155 


another.  But  in  the  faculty  of  attention,  there  is 
revealed  to  us  another  power,  even  that  by  which 
the  will  hath  power  over  the  mind ;  and  in  virtue 
of  which  it  is  now  expatiating  over  one  particular 
scene  of  thought,  or  engaged  with  one  set  of  con¬ 
templations  rather  than  with  another.  If,  in  the 
one  case,  it  was  by  a  voluntary  act  that  we  came 
to  see  certain  objects;  and  so,  if  any  emotions 
were  awakened  by  them,  to  have  willed  them  into 
being — so,  in  the  other  case,  it  is  by  a  voluntary 
act  that  we  come  to  think  of  certain  objects ;  and 
so,  in  one  most  important  sense  may  it  be  said, 
that  we  will  all  the  emotions  which  follow  in  their 
train.  By  the  power  which  the  will  has  over  'the 
muscles  of  the  human  frame,  we  are  enabled  to 
proceed  a  certain  way  in  demonstrating  that  man 
has  a  certain  control  over  his  emotions,  even  over 
those  which  are  suggested  by  the  objects  which  at 
his  choice  he  may  or  may  not  be  in  the  local  con¬ 
dition  of  observing.  But  it  will  go  far  to  expedite 
our  way  and  to  set  us  onward  in  this  important 
explanation — when  we  come  within  sight  of  that 
other  power  which  the  will  has  over  the  processes 
of  the  human  understanding,  and  by  which  the 
flitting  operations  of  thought  are  brought  in  some 
measure  under  its  ascendancy.  We  have  already 
found  how  it  is  that  a  train  of  feelings  may  be  set 
agoing,  by  a  movement  under  the  direction  of  will 
on  the  part  of  the  outer  man — and  we  may  expect 
from  the  ceaseless  activity  of  mind,  and  the  place 
of  central  authority  which  it  holds  over  the  whole 
system  of  human  conduct,  that  a  wider  scope  must 
be  given  to  the  will  and  tx)  its  influence  on  the 


156 


COMMAND  WHICH  THE  WILL 


pathology  of  the  emotions,  by  the  known  efficacy 
wherewith  it  can  touch  the  inner  mechanism,  and 
act  as  a  regulator  at  the  very  place  where  the 
emotions  do  play. 

21.  If  it  be  by  a  voluntary  act  that  we  come  to 
see  certain  objects,  then,  whatever  the  emotions 
are  which  are  awakened  by  these  objects,  in  as  far 
as  they  are  so  awakened,  we  may  be  said  to  have 

willed  them  into  being _ In  like  manner,  if  it  be 

by  a  voluntary  act  that  we  come  to  think  of  cer¬ 
tain  objects,  then  may  it  also  be  said,  that  we  will 
all  the  emotions  which  follow  in  their  train.  It  is 
admitted  on  all  hands,  that,  by  the  power  which 
the  will  has  over  the  muscles  of  the  human  frame, 
it  can  either  summon  into  presence  or  bid  away 
certain  objects  of  sight.  And,  notwithstanding 
the  effect  which  the  expositions  of  certain  meta¬ 
physical  reasoners  have  had  in  obscuring  the  pro¬ 
cess,  it  is  also  admitted,  almost  universally,  that, 
by  the  power  which  the  will  has  over  the  thinking 
processes,  it  can  either  summon  into  presence  or 
bid  away  certain  objects  of  thought.  The  faculty 
of  attention  we  regard  as  the  great  instrument  for 
the  achievement  of  this — the  ligament  which  binds 
the  one  department  of  our  constitution  to  the  other 
— the  messenger,  to  whose  wakefulness  and  activity 
we  owe  all  those  influences,  which  pass  and  repass 
in  constant  succession  between  our  moral  and  in¬ 
tellectual  nature. 

22.  Dr.  Reid,  in  his  book  on  the  active  powers, 
has  a  most  important  chapter  on  those  operations 
of  the  mind  that  are  called  voluntary.  Among 
these,  he  gives  a  foremost  place  to  attention — 


HAS  OVER  THE  EMOTIONS.  157 

where,  instead  however  of  any  profound  or  careful 
analysis,  he  presents  us  with  a  number  of  very 
sensible  remarks;  and  from  the  undoubted  part 
which  the  will  has  in  the  guidance  and  exercise  of 
this  faculty,  he  comes  to  the  sound  conclusion,  that 
a  great  part  of  wisdom  and  virtue  consists  in  giving 
the  proper  direction  to  it. 

23.  Dugald  Stewart  ranks  attention  among  the 
intellectual  faculties ; — and  seems  to  regard  it  as 
an  original  power,  which  had  very  much  escaped 
the  notice  of  former  observers.  But  Dr.  Brown 
we  hold  to  have  been  far  the  most  successful  in 
his  expositions  of  this  faculty;  and  by  which  he 
makes  it  evident,  that  it  is  not  more  distinct  from 
the  mental  perception  of  any  object  of  thought, 
than  the  faculty  of  looking  to  any  object  of  sight, 
is  distinct  from  the  faculty  of  seeing  it. 

24.  In  his  chapter  on  the  external  affections 
combined  with  desire,  he  institutes  a  beautiful 
analysis ;  in  the  conduct  of  which,  he  has  thrown 
the  magic  tints  of  poetry  over  a  process  of  very 
abstract  but  conclusive  reasoning.  We  fear,  that, 
in  this  age  of  superficial  readers,  the  public  are  far 
from  being  adequately  aware  of  that  wondrous 
combination  of  talent,  which  this  singularly  gifted 
individual  realized  in  his  own  person ;  and  with 
what  facility,  yet  elegance,  he  could  intersperse 
the  graces  of  fancy,  among  the  demonstrations  of 
a  most  profound  and  original  metaphysics.  The 
passage  to  which  we  now  refer,  is  perhaps  the 
finest  exemplification  of  this  in  all  his  volumes ; 
and  though  we  can  hardly  hope,  that  the  majority, 
even  of  the  well  educated,  will  ever  be  tempted  to 


158  COMMAND  WHICH  THE  WILL 

embark  on  bis  adventurous  speculations — yet  many, 
we  doubt  not,  have  been  ied  by  the  fascination  of 
his  minor  accomplishments,  to  brave  the  depths 
and  the  difficulties  of  that  masterly  course  which 
he  has  given  to  the  world.  For,  among  the  steeps 
and  the  arduous  elevations  of  that  high  walk  which 
he  has  taken,  he  kindly  provides  the  reader  with 
many  a  resting  place — some  enchanted  spot  over 
which  the  hand  of  taste  hath  thrown  her  choicest 
decorations ;  or  where,  after  the  fatigues  and  the 
triumphs  of  successful  intellect,  the  traveller  may 
from  the  eminence  that  he  has  won,  look  abroad 
on  some  sweet  or  noble  perspective,  which  the 
great  master  whose  footsteps  he  follows  hath 
thrown  open  to  his  gaze.  It  is  thus  that  there  is 
a  constant  relief  and  refreshment  afforded,  along 
that  ascending  way,  which,  but  for  this,  would  be 
most  severely  intellectual ;  and  if  never  was  philo¬ 
sophy  more  abstruse,  yet  never  was  it  seasoned  so 
exquisitely,  or  spread  over  a  page  so  rich  in  all 
those  attic  delicacies  of  the  imagination  and  the 
style,  which  could  make  the  study  of  it  attractive. 

25.  There  is  a  philosophy,  not  more  solid  or 
more  sublime  of  achievement  than  his,  but  of 
sterner  frame — that  would  spurn  “  the  fairy  dreams 
of  sacred  fountains  and  Elysian  groves  and  vales 
of  bliss.”  For  these  he  ever  had  most  benignant 
toleration,  and  himself  sported  among  the  crea¬ 
tions  of  poetic  genius.  We  are  aware  of  nought 
more  fascinating,  than  the  kindness  and  compla¬ 
cency  wherewith  philosophy,  in  some  of  the 
finer  spirits  of  our  race,  can  make  her  graceful 
descent  into  a  humbler  but  lovelier  region  than 


r 


HAS  OVER  THE  EMOTIONS, 


159 


her  own — when  “the  intellectual  power  bends 
from  his  awful  throne  a  willing  ear  and  smiles.” 

26.  “if,”  says  Dr.  Brown,  “  Nature  has  given 
us  the  power  of  seeing  many  objects  at  once,  she 
has  given  us  also  the  faculty  of  looking  but  to  one 
— that  is  to  say  of  directing  our  eyes  on  one  only 
of  the  multitude;”  and  again,  “there  are  some 
objects  which  are  more  striking  than  others,  and 
which  of  themselves  almost  call  us  to  look  at  them. 
They  are  the  predominant  objects,  around  which 
others  seem  to  arrange  themselves.” 

27.  The  difference  between  seeing  a  thing  and 
looking  at  it,  is  tantamount  to  the  difference  which 
there  is,  between  the  mere  presence  of  a  thought 
in  one’s  mind  and  the  mind’s  attention  to  that 
which  is  the  object  of  thought.  Now  the  look, 
according  to  Dr.  Brown’s  analysis,  is  made  up  of 
the  simple  external  affection  of  sight,"  and  a  desire 
to  know  more  about  some  one  of  the  things  which 
we  do  see.  We  think  it  the  natural  consequence 
of  the  error  into  which  he  has  fallen,  of  confound- 
inor  the  desire  with  the  will,  that  he  has  failed  in 
giving  a  complete  or  continuous  enough  descrip¬ 
tion  of  the  process  of  attention — for,  without  any 
violence  to  the  order  of  his  own  very  peculiar 
contemplations,  he  might  have  gone  on  to  say,  as 
the  effect  of  this  mixed  perception  and  desire  on 
the  part  of  the  observer,  that  he  willed  to  look  to 
the  object  in  question  ;  and  he  might  have  spoken 
of  the  volition  which  fastened  his  eye  and  his 
attention  upon  it.  Both  he  and  Mr.  Mill  seem 
averse  to  the  intervention  of  the  will  in  this  exer- 
cise^  at  all — the  one  finding  room  only  for  desire ; 


160 


COMMAND  WHICH  THE  WILL 


and  the  other  for  his  processes  of  association, 
ascribing  attention  to  the  mere  occurrence  of  in¬ 
teresting  sensations  or  ideas  in  the  train.  Now 
if  this  question  is  to  be  decided  by  observation  at 
all,  or  by  consciousness  which  is  the  faculty  of 
internal  observation,  the  mental  states  of  desiring 
and  willing  seem  just  as  distinguishable  as  any 
other  mental  states  whatever.  At  the  time  when 
the  mind  desires,  it  bears  a  respect  towards  the 
desirable  object ;  at  the  time  when  it  wills,  it 
bears  a  respect  towards  something  different  from 
this,  to  that  act  of  its  own  which  is  put  forth  for 
the  purpose  of  attaining  the  object.  The  desire 
that  is  felt  towards  the  object  is  specifically  a  dis¬ 
tinct  thing,  from  the  volition  which  prompts  or 
precedes  the  action ;  and  therefore  it  should 
not  be  confounded  with  the  volition.  And  in 
like  manner,  a  feeling  of  interest  in  an  idea, 
or  rather  in  the  object  of  an  idea  is  quite  dis¬ 
tinguishable  from  that  volition  which  respects  a 
something  different  from  this  object — which  re¬ 
spects  an  act  or  exercise  of  the  mind,  even  the 
attention  that  we  shall  give  to  it.  The  interest 
that  is  felt  in  any  object  of  thought,  may  have 
been  the  cause,  and  the  sole  cause,  of  the  atten¬ 
tion  which  we  give  to  it.  But  the  necessary 
connexion  which  obtains  between  the  parts  of  a 
process  is  no  reason  why  we  should  overlook  any 
part,  or  confound  the  different  parts  with  each 
other.  In  this  instance,  Mr.  Hume  seems  to 
have  observed  more  accurately  than  either  of 
the  philosophers  whom  we  have  now  named,  when 
he  discriminates  between  the  will  and  the  desire; 


HAS  OVER  THE  E3IOTIONS.  '  IGl 

and  tells  us  of  the  former,  that  it  exerts  itself 
when  the  thing  desired  is  to  be  attained  by  any 
action  of  the  mind  or  body.  A  volition  is  as 
distinctly  felt  in  the  mental  as  in  the  bodily  pro¬ 
cess — although  it  be  in  the  latter  only,  that  the 
will  first  acts  on  some  one  of  the  muscles  as  its 
instrument,  and  issues  in  a  visible  movement  as  its 
required  service.  The  power  of  the  will  over  an 
intellectual  process  is  marked  by  the  diflerence, 
the  palpable  difference  which  there  is,  between  a 
regulated  train  of  thought  and  a  passive  reverie. 
And  there  is  nothing  in  the  intervention  of  the 
will  to  contravene,  or  even  to  modify  the  general 
laws  of  association.  Neither  does  the  wish  to 
recover  a  particular  idea,  involve  in  it  the  incon¬ 
gruity  of  that  idea  being  both  present  with  and 
absent  from  the  mind  at  the  same  time.  We  may 
not  have  an  idea  that  is  absent,  and  yet  have  the 
knowledge  of  its  being  related  to  some  other  idea 
that  is  present ;  and  we  therefore  attend  to  this 
latter  idea  and  dwell  upon  it,  for  the  purpose,  as  is 
well  expressed  by  Mr.  Mill,  of  “giving  it  the 
opportunity  of  exciting  all  the  ideas  with  which  it 
is  associated ;  for  by  not  attending  to  it,  we  de¬ 
prive  it  more  or  less  of  that  opportunity.”  It  is 
therefore,  as  he  elsewhere  expresses  it,  that  we 
detain  certain  ideas  and  suffer  others  to  pass. 
But  there  is  nothing  inconsistent  with  the  laws  or 
phenomena  of  association,  in  our  saying  of  this  act  of 
detention  that  it  is  a  voluntary  act — that  we  detain 
certain  ideas  because  we  will  to  detain  them.* 

*  See  the  chapter  on  the  Will  in  Mill’s  Analysis  of  the  Human 
Mind. 


162 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


CHAPTER  V. 

On  the  Morality  of  the  ILmotions, 

1.  Having  illustrated  the  distinction  between  the 
passive  and  the  voluntary,  in  those  processes  the 
terminating  result  of  which  is  some  particular 
state  of  an  emotion,  and  which  emotion  in  that 
state  often  impels  to  a  particular  act  or  series  of 
acts — we  would  now  affirm  the  all-important  prin¬ 
ciple,  that  nothing  is  moral  or  immoral  which  is 
not  voluntary.  We  have  often  been  struck  with 
writers  upon  Moral  Science,  in  that,  even  though 
professing  a  view  or  an  argument  altogether  ele¬ 
mentary,  they  seldom  come  formally  or  ostensibly 
forth  with  this  principle.  They  presume  it,  and 
they  proceed  upon  it,  often  without  having  so 
much  as  ever  announced  it.  They  bestow  upon 
it  a  treatment  more  axiomatic,  if  we  may  be  allow¬ 
ed  the  expression,  than  Euclid  hath  bestowed 
upon  his  mathematical  axioms,  and  of  which  many 
do  think  that  he  might  have  taken  the  immediate 
use,  without  the  previous  ceremony  of  such  an 
introduction  as  he  has  given  to  them.  All  men, 
it  has  been  thought,  do  so  certainly  know  and  so 
irresistibly  believe  a  whole  to  be  greater  than  any 
of  its  parts,  that  any  step  of  a  geometrical  demon¬ 
stration  which  implied  it  would  have  been  held  to 
be  as  firm  without  any  initial  statement  of  it  at 
all,  and  without  the  appeal  of  any  marginal  refer¬ 
ence  to  it  in  the  subsequent  trains  of  reasoning. 
Now  it  is  thus  that  the  principle  which  binds 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  163 

together,  as  it  were,  the  moral  and  the  voluntary 
has  been  very  much  proceeded  upon  in  Ethics. 
It  has  been  regarded  so  much  in  the  light  of  a 
familiar  acquaintance,  as  not  to  have  required  any 
formal  introduction  to  the  reader ;  and  so  it  has 
passed  without  any  respectful  notice  at  the  outset, 
however  freely  and  frequently  made  use  of  in  the 
subsequent  demonstrations.  We  think  it  for  the 
advantage  of  our  subject,  that  it  should  receive  a 
different  treatment — that  it  should  be  announced, 
and  with  somewhat  the  pomp  and  circumstance  too 
of  a  first  principle — and  have  the  distinction  given 
to  it,  not  of  a  tacit,  but  of  a  proclaimed  axiom  in 
Moral  Science. 

2.  We  must  here  except  Dr.  Reid  from  the 
charge  of  not  having  especially  and  prominently 
brought  forth  this  principle  to  the  notice  of  his 
readers.  In  his  book  on  the  Active  Powers  of 
the  human  mind,  we  meet,  upon  this  subject, 
not  with  the  acuteness  of  a  very  subtle,  but  with 
the  sound  judgment  of  a  very  wise  and  sensible 
observer.  For  the  sake  of  his  sound  and  whole¬ 
some  understanding,  on  every  subject  where  he 
does  not  go  beyond  his  depths,  the  student  of 
Moral  Science  would  do  well  to  give  this  book  his 
attentive  perusal.  We  think  him  wrong  on  the 
question  which  has  arrayed  one  half  of  the 
mental  philosophers  of  the  world  against  the  other 
— we  mean  the  question  of  Liberty  and  Necessity. 
His  speculative  views  upon  this  controversy  do 
not  affect,  however,  the  value  of  what  may  be 
called  his  descriptive  remarks  on  the  powers  .and 
operations  of  the  human  mind — which,  though 


164 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


delivered  more  in  the  style  of  aphorisms  than  vdth 
any  thing  like  a  strain  of  philosophy,  yet  have 
most  of  them  such  a  character  of  obvious  and 
experimental  truth,  as  to  carry  the  perfect  acqui¬ 
escence  of  the  reader  along  with  him.  “  Nothing,” 
says  he,  “  in  which  the  will  is  not  concerned,  can 
justly  be  accounted  either  virtuous  or  immoral.” 
And  he  adds,  “  The  practice  of  all  criminal  courts 
and  all  enlightened  nations  is  founded  upon  it.” 
And,  “  that  if  any  judicature  in  any  nation  should 
find  a  man  guilty  and  the  object  of  punishment, 
for  what  they  allow  to  be  altogether  involuntary, 
all  the  world  would  condemn  them  as  men  who 
knew  nothing  of  the  first  and  most  fundamental 
rules  of  justice.” 

3.  It  is  of  the  greater  importance  for  the  student 
of  moral  science  to  be  familiar  with  such  plain 
writings  as  these  of  Dr.  Reid — that,  in  his  intent 
prosecution  of  a  profounder  analysis  than  this 
author  has  attempted;  and  in  the  use  of  those 
appropriate  terms  which  are  employed  for  express¬ 
ing  the  results  of  it,  when  w^e  have  often  to  desert 
the  common  language — we  are  apt  to  lose  sight  of 
certain  great  and  palpable  truths,  of  which  that 
language  is  the  ordinary  vehicle.  When  tracing 
the  intermediate  steps,  between  the  first  exposure 
of  the  mind  to  a  seducing  influence,  and  the  deed 
or  perpetration  of  enormity  into  which  it  is  hurried, 
we  are  engaged  in  what  may  properly  be  termed  a 
physical  inquiry — as  much  so,  as  when  passing 
from  cause  to  consequent,  we  are  attending  to  any 
succession  or  train  of  phenomena  in  the  material 
world.  But  it  is  when  thus  employed,  that  we 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


165 


are  apt  to  lose  sight  of  the  moral  character  of 
that  which  we  are  contemplating;  and  to  forget 
when  or  at  what  point  of  the  series  it  is,  that  the 
designation  whether  of  virtuous  or  vicious,  the 
charge  whether  of  merit  or  demerit,  comes  to 
be  applicable.  It  is  well  that,  amid  all  the  diffi¬ 
culties  attendant  on  the  physiological  inquiry,  there 
should  be  such  a  degree  of  clearness  and  unifor¬ 
mity  in  the  moral  judgments  of  men — .insomuch 
that  the  peasant  can  with  a  just  and  prompt  dis¬ 
cernment,  equal  to  that  of  the  philosopher,  seize 
on  the  real  moral  characteristics  of  any  action 
submitted  to  his  notice,  and  pronounce  on  the 
merit  or  demerit  of  him  who  has  performed  it.  It 
is  in  attending  to  these  popular,  or  rather  univer¬ 
sal  decisions,  that  we  learn  the  real  principles  of 
Moral  Science. 

4.  And  the  first  certainly  of  these  popular,  or 
rather  universal  decisions,  is  that  nothing  is  moral 
or  immoral  that  is  not  voluntary.  A  murderer 
may  be  conceived,  instead  of  striking  with  the 
dagger  in  his  own  hand,  to  force  it  by  an  act  of 
refined  cruelty,  into  the  hand  of  him,  who  is  the 
dearest  relative  or  friend  of  his  devoted  victim; 
and  by  his  superior  strength  to  compel  the  strug¬ 
gling  and  the  reluctant  instrument  to  its  grasp. 
He  may  thus  confine  it  to  the  hand,  and  give  im¬ 
pulse  to  the  arm  of  one,  who  recoils  in  utmost 
horror  from  that  perpetration,  of  which  he  has  been 
made  as  it  were  the  material  engine ;  and  could 
matters  be  so  contrived,  as  that  the  real  murderer 
should  be  invisible,  while  the  arm  and  the  hand 
that  enclosed  the  weapon  and  the  movements  of  the 


166 


MORALITY  OP  THE  EMOTIONS. 


ostensible  one  should  alone  be  patent  to  the  eve  ot 
the  senses — then  he,  and  not  the  other,  would  be 
held  by  the  bystander  as  chargeable  with  the  guilt. 
But  so  soon  as  the  real  nature  of  the  transaction 
came  to  be  understood,  this  imputation  would  be 
wholly  and  instantly  transferred.  The  distinction 
would  at  once  be  recognised  between  the  willing 
agent  in  this  deed  of  horror,  and  the  unwilling 
instrument.  There  would  no  more  of  moral  blame 
be  attached  to  the  latter  than  to  the  weapon  which 
inflicted  the  mortal  blow ;  and  on  the  former  ex¬ 
clusively,  the  whole  burden  of  the  crime  and  its 
condemnation  would  be  laid.  And  the  simple 
difference  which  gives  rise  to  the  whole  of  this  moral 
distinction  in  the  estimate  between  them  is,  that 
with  the  one  the  act  was  with  the  will ;  with  the 
other  it  was  against  it. 

5.  This  fixes  a  point  of  deepest  interest,  even 
that  step  in  the  process  that  leads  to  an  emotion, 
at  which  the  character  of  right  or  wrong  comes 
to  be  applicable.  It  is  not  at  that  point,  when 
the  appetites  or  affections  of  our  nature  solicit  from 
the  will  a  particular  movement ;  neither  is  it  at 
that  point  when  either  a  rational  self-love  or  a  sense 
of  duty  remonstrates  against  it.  It  is  not  at  that 
point  when  the  consent  of  the  will  is  pleaded  for, 
on  the  one  side  or  other — but,  all-important  to  bo 
borne  in  mind,  it  is  at  that  point  when  the  consent 
is  given.  When  we  characterize  a  court  at  law 
for  some  one  of  its  deeds — it  is  not  upon  the 
urgency  of  the  argument  on  one  side  of  the  ques¬ 
tion,  or  of  the  reply  upon  the  other,  that  we  found 
our  estimate ;  but  wholly  upon  the  der  iaicn  of  the 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


167 


bench,  which  decision  is  carried  into  effect  by  a 
certain  order  given  out  to  the  officers  who  execute 
it.  And  so,  in  characterizing  an  individual  for 
some  one  of  his  doings,  we  found  our  estimate  not 
upon  the  desires  of  appetite  that  may  have  insti¬ 
gated  him  on  the  one  hand,  or  upon  the  dictates 
of  conscience  that  may  have  withstood  these  upon 
the  other — not  upon  the  elements  that  conflicted 
in  the  struggle,  but  on  the  determination  that  put 
an  end  to  it — even  that  determination  of  the  will 
which  is  carried  into  effect  by  those  volitions,  on 
the  issuing  of  which,  the  hands,  and  the  feet,  and 
the  ether  instruments  of  action  are  put  into  instant 
subserviency. 

6.  To  prove  how  essentially  linked  together  the 
morality  of  any  act  is  with  its  wilful  ness,  it  is  of 
no  consequence  whether  the  volition  that  gave  rise 
to  the  act,  be  the  one  which  pi*eceded  it  immedi¬ 
ately  as  its  proximate  cause,  or  be  a  remote  and 
anterior  volition — in  which  latter  case  it  is  termed 
a  purpose,  conceived  at  some  period  which  may 
have  long  gone  by,  but  which  was  kept  unalterable 
till  the  opportunity  for  its  execution  came  round.* 
I'here  may  be  an  interval  of  time,  between  that 
resolution  of  the  will  which  is  effective,  and  that 
performance  by  which  it  is  carried  into  effect. 
One  may  resolve  to-day,  with  full  consent  and 


*  It  is  true  that  if  the  desire  were  to  cease  for  the  object  to 
be  attained  by  the  proposed  act,  the  purpose  would  cease  along 
with  it,  but  it  were  confounding  the  things  which  in  reality  are 
distinct  from  eacli  other,  to  represent  on  this  account  the  desire 
and  the  purpose  as  synonymous.  The  one  respects  the  object 
that  is  wished  for ;  the  other  respects  the  action,  by  which  tVia 
object  is  to  bo  attained. 


168 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


purpose  of  the  will  on  some  criminal  enterprise  for 
to-morrow.  It  is  to-day  that  he  has  become  the 
criminal,  and  has  incurred  a  guilt  to  which  even 
the  performance  of  the  morrow  may  bring  no 
addition,  and  no  enhancement.  The  performance 
of  to-morrow  does  not  constitute  the  guilt,  but 
only  indicates  it.  It  may  prove  what  before  the 
execution  of  the  will  was  still  an  uncertainty.  It 
may  prove  the  strength  of  that  determination, 
which  has  been  already  taken — how  it  can  stand 
its  ground  through  all  the  hours  which  intervene 
between  the  desire  and  its  fulfilment ;  how  mean¬ 
while  the  visitations  of  reflection  and  remorse  have 
been  kept  at  a  distance,  or  all  been  disregarded ; 
how,  with  relentless  depravity,  the  purpose  has 
been  adhered  to,  and  the  remonstrances  of  con¬ 
science  or  perhaps  the  entreaties  of  virtuous  friend¬ 
ship  have  all  been  set  at  nought ;  how  with  a  hardi,- 
hood,  that  could  brave  alike  the  disgrace  and  the 
condemnation  which  attach  to  moral  worthlessness, 
he  could  proceed  with  unfaltering  step  from  the  re¬ 
probate  design  to  its  full  and  final  accomplishment — 
nor  sufifer  all  the  suggestions  of  his  leisure  and  soli¬ 
tude,  how^ever  affecting  the  thought  of  that  inno¬ 
cence  which  he  is  now  on  the  eve  of  forfeiting,  or  a 
tenderness  for  those  relatives  who  are  to  be  deeply 
wounded  by  the  tidings  of  his  fall,  or  the  authority 
of  a  father’s  parting  advice,  or  the  remembrance 
of  a  mother’s  prayers,  to  stay  his  hand. 

7.  That  an  action  then  be  the  rightful  object 
either  of  moral  censure  or  approval,  it  must  have 
had  the  consent  of  the  will  to  go  along  with  it.  It 
must  be  the  fruit  of  a  volition — else  it  is  utterly 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  1G3 

beyond  the  scope,  either  of  praise  for  its  virtuous¬ 
ness  or  of  blame  for  its  criminality.  If  an  action 
be  involuntary,  it  is  as  unfit  a  subject  for  any 
moral  reckoning  as  are  the  pulsations  of  the  wrist. 
Something  ludicrous  might  occur  which  all  of  a 
sudden  sets  one  irresistibly  on  the  action  of 
laughing  ;  or  a  tale  of  distress  might  be  told,  which 
whether  he  wills  or  not,  forces  from  him  the  tears 
of  sympathy,  and  sets  him  as  irresistibly  on  the 
^  action  of  weeping ;  or,  on  the  appearance  of  a 
ferocious  animal  he  might  struggle  with  all  his 
power  for  a  serene  and  manly  firmness,  yet  struggle 
in  vain  against  the  action  of  trembling ;  or  if, 
instead  of  a  formidable,  a  loathsome  animal  was 
presented  to  his  notice,  he  might  no  more  help  the 
action  of  a  violent  recoil  perhaps  antipathy  against 
it,  than  he  can  help  any  of  the  organic  necessities 
of  that  constitution  which  has  been  given  to  him ; 
or  even  upon  the  observation  of  what  is  disgusting 
in  the  habit  or  countenance  of  a  fellow-man,  he  may 
be  overpowered  into  a  sudden  and  sensitive  aver¬ 
sion  ;  and  lastly,  should  some  gross  and  grievous 
transgression  against  the  decencies  of  civilized  life 
be  practised  before  him,  he  might  no  more  be  able 
to  stop  that  rush  of  blood  to  the  complexion 
which  marks  the  inward  workings  of  an  outraged 
and  offended  delicacy,  than  he  is  able  to  alter  or 
suspend  the  law  of  its  circulation.  In  each  of 
these  cases  the  action  is  involuntary  ;  and  precisely 
because  it  is  so,  the  epithet  neither  of  morally 
good  nor  of  morally  evil  can  be  applied  to  it. 
And  so  of  every  action  that  comes,  thus  to  speak, 
of  its  own  accord ;  and  not  at  the  will  or  bidding 

VOL.  V,  H 


170 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


of  the  agent.  It  may  be  painful  to  himself.  It 
may  also  be  painful  to  others.  But  if  it  have  not 
had  the  consent  of  his  will,  even  that  consent 
without  which  no  action  that  is  done  can  be  called 
voluntary,  it  is  his  misfortune  and  not  his  choice  ; 
and  though  not  indifferent  in  regard  to  its  conse¬ 
quences  on  the  happiness  of  man,  yet,  merely  be¬ 
cause  disjoined  from  the  will,  it  in  point  of  moral 
estimation  is  an  act  of  the  purest  indifference. 

8.  We  may  now  learn  the  importance  of  the 
distinction  between  the  phenomena  of  mind  in  its 
state  of  passiveness,  and  of  mind  in  its  state  of 
activity — between  that  which  it  undergoes  in 
virtue  of  its  pathological  constitution,  and  that 
which  it  does  in  virtue  of  the  power  wherewith  the 
will  is  invested  over  all  those  instruments  of 
performance  that  have  been  so  richly  furnished  to 
the  mechanism  both  of  the  outer  and  the  inner 
man.  It  is  for  the  latter  and  the  latter  only — it  is 
for  those  actions  which  he  himself  hath  bidden  into 
existence,  because  it  was  his  will  that  they  should 
be  done — it  is  not  because  his  desire  did  solicit, 
but  because  his  desire  did  prevail — it  is  not  be¬ 
cause  his  passions  and  his  affections  and  his  sensi¬ 
bilities  urged  him  on  to  that  which  is  evil,  but 
because  his  will  first  fostered  their  incitements  and 
then  lent  itself  to  their  unworthy  gratification — it 
is  for  this  and  for  this  alone  that  he  is  the  subject 
of  a  moral  reckoning — it  is  at  the  point  when  the 
will  hath  formed  its  purpose,  or  sent  forth  to  the 
various  dependents  upon  its  authority  its  edicts  for 
the  execution  of  it — it  is  then  that  the  praise  of 
righteousness  is  earned,  or  tlien  that  the  guilt  of 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  I7l 

iniquity  is  contracted.  Give  me  an  action  of  which 
it  can  be  said  that  it  has  been  done  because  I 
chose  the  doing  of  it,  or  that  it  had  not  been  done 
if  I  had  chosen  otherwise — and  then  I  recognise 
it  at  once  as  an  instance  to  which  all  the  tests  of 
morality  are  justly  applicable.  It  may  still  be  an 
indiflferent  action  as  many  of  our  voluntary  actions 
are — and  that  because  either  of  their  innocence  or 
their  downright  insignificancy — but  if  in  the  matter 
of  them  they  involve  the  performance  or  transgres¬ 
sion  of  any  rule  of  rectitude,  then  as  when  not 
wilful  they  attach  no  merit  of  any  kind  to  the  agent, 
so  it  is  the  circumstance  of  their  being  wilful 
that  impregnates  them  either  with  all  their  moral 
worth  or  with  all  their  moral  delinquency.  We 
read  in  political  law  of  criminals  being  tried  with¬ 
out  benefit  of  clergy ;  and  so  all  crimes  that  be 
wilful  are  tried  without  benefit  of  pathology. 
There  are  circumstances  under  which  pathology 
might  be  pled  in  mitigation  of  damages ;  but  even 
this  implies  that  the  essence  of  crime  lies  in  its 
wilfulness — a  principle  of  the  first  consequence  in 
morals ;  and  which,  however  obvious  to  common 
sense,  teems  with  corollaries,  not  less  important 
in  themselves,  than  strangely  overlooked  both  by 
ethical  writers  and  by  the  private  and  practical 
disciples  of  morality. 

9.  We  rniglit  be  charged  perhaps  with  expatiat¬ 
ing  too  long  upon  a  truism.  For  what  can  be 
more  obvious,  it  may  be  thought,  than  that,  apart 
from  the  will,  there  can  be  neither  moral  worth  nor 
moral  wortlilessness — ^that  the  very  notion  of 
desert  implies  an  action  which  has  been  voluntary 


172  MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS, 

— and  that  actions  without  volitions  are  no  more 
susceptible  of  any  moral  reckoning,  than  is  a  river 
for  its  destroying  floods,  or  the  wind  of  heaven  for 
its  list  of  melancholy  shipwrecks?  But  if  such  be 
the  light  and  such  the  lustre  of  the  principle  that 
it  has  indeed  the  force  and  evidence  of  an  axiom, 
this  ought  to  stamp  the  greater  evidence  on  all 
the  corollaries  that  might  be  legitimately  educed 
from  it. 

10.  First  then  we  may  be  helped  by  this  prin¬ 
ciple  to  estimate  the  moral  character  of  an  emo¬ 
tion — or  to  determine  in  how  far  the  element  of 
moral  worth  is  at  all  implicated  therein.  There 
is  an  arrangement  by  which  Dr.  Brown  divides  the 
emotions  into  those  that  do  involve  a  moral  feeling, 
and  those  that  do  not — and  we  should  like  if,  for 
the  vague  impression  that  after  all  is  left  upon  the 
mind  by  this  distribution  which  he  has  made  of 
them,  there  could  be  substituted  a  precise  and  clear 
understanding  of  the  way,  in  which  the  moral  char¬ 
acter  of  a  man  and  the  state  of  his  emotions  stand 
related  the  one  to  the  other.  The  truth  is  that 
all  the  emotions  might  be  conceived  to  involve  a 
moral  feeling,  if  not  characteristically,  at  least 
historically.  Take  the  emotion  of  taste  for  an 
example,  for  the  indulgence  of  which  I  might  linger 
whole  hours  on  some  scene  of  loveliness,  and  not 
tear  myself  away  although  there  be  the  call  of  a 
positive  engagement  upon  me,  and  I  to  prolong 
my  gratification  have  incurred  the  guilt  of  a  broken 
promise.  Then  it  may  be  said  that  a  moral  feel¬ 
ing  has  been  involved,  historically  at  least  as  we 
have  just  said  if  not  characteristically — and  that 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  173 

DV  an  emotion  which  is  said  to  involve  in  it  no 
moral  feeling.  But  it  is  better  to  take  an  exem¬ 
plification  from  some  emotion,  whereof  it  is  said  that 
it  does  involve  a  moral  feeling,  therefore  character¬ 
istically  we  presume,  and  let  that  emotion  be  sym¬ 
pathy.  It  may  just  be  as  much  the  result  of  our 
organic  framework  as  the  emotion  of  taste — and 
what  is  more,  like  this  too,  it  may  lead  us  to  coun¬ 
teract  a  moral  obligation — to  aid  the  escape  of  a 
criminal  from  the  hands  of  justice,  and  even  to 
overpower  the  conviction  which  we  have  that  by 
so  doing,  we  again  let  loose  an  incurable  pest  upon 
society.  The  truth  is,  that,  by  giving  way  to 
sympathy,  we  can  conceive  an  occasion,  in  which  a 
very  solemn  moral  obligation  might  be  thwarted 
and  trampled  upon.  We  cannot  think  of  any 
responsibility  more  grave  and  urgent,  than  that 
which  lies  upon  a  judge  who  is  the  constituted 
guardian  of  the  rights  and  interests  of  society  ;  and 
who  often  does  a  righteous  thing,  when,  in  despite 
of  his  sympathy,  when  in  opposition  to  its  move¬ 
ments,  his  will  stands  its  ground  against  all  the 
pleadings  that  reach  his  ear,  from  the  afflicted  father 
of  some  unhapj)}',  delinquent,  or  from  the  members 
of  his  weeping  and  imploring  family.  And  thus, 
by  the  indulgence  of  his  taste,  a  man  might  do 
what  is  morally  wrong ;  and,  by  the  resistance  he 
makes  to  his  own  inward  sympathy,  he  might  do 
what  is  morally  right. 

1 1 .  How  it  may  be  asked  can  any  moral  char¬ 
acter  be  affixed  to  an  emotion,  which  seems  to  be 
an  organic  or  pathological  phenomenon,  where¬ 
with  the  will  may  have  little,  perhaps  nothing  to 


174 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS 


do?  Nothing  we  have  affirmed  is  either. virtuous 
or  vicious,  unless  the  voluntary  in  some  way  inter¬ 
mingles  with  it;  and  how  then  shall  we  vindicate 
the  moral  rank  which  is  commonly  assigned  to  the 
mere  susceptibilities  of  our  nature  ?  We  regard 
compassion  as  a  virtuous  sensibility,  and  we  regard 
malignity,  or  licentiousness,  or  envy  as  so  many 
depraved  affections  ;  and  yet,  on  our  principle,  they 
are  virtuous  or  vicious,  only  in  so  far  as  they  are 
wilful.  It  is  clearly  at  the  bidding  of  his  will, 
that  a  man  acts  with  his  hand,  and  therefore  we 
are  at  no  loss  to  hold  him  responsible  for  his 
doings  ;  but  we  must  learn  how  it  is  at  the  bidding 
of  his  will  that  he  feels  with  his  heart,  ere  we  can 
hold  him  responsible  for  his  desires.  If,  apart 
from  the  will,  there  he  neither  moral  worth  nor 
moral  worthlessness — if  it  be  implied  in  the  very 
notion  of  desert,  that  the  will  has  had  some  con¬ 
cern  in  that  which  we  thus  characterise — if  neither 
actions  nor  affections  are,  without  volitions,  suscep¬ 
tible  of  any  moral  reckoning — it  may  require  some 
consideration  to  perceive,  how  far  the  element  of 
moral  worth  is  at  all  implicated  in  an  emotion.  If 
the  emotions  of  sympathy  be  as  much  the  result  of 
an  organic  framework  as  the  emotions  of  taste,  and 
if  this  be  true  of  all  the  emotions — it  remains  to  be 
seen,  why  either  praise  or  censure  should  be 
awarded  to  any  of  them.  Whether  an  emotion  of 
taste  arises  within  me  at  the  sight  of  beauty,  or 
an  emotion  of  pity  at  the  sight  of  distress — the 
mind  may  have  been  as  passive,  or  there  may  have 
been  as  much  of  the  strictly  pathological  in  the 
one  emotion  as  in  the  other. 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


175 


12.  Now  it  may  be  very  true,  that  the  will  has 
as  little  to  do  with  that  pathological  law,  by  which 
the  sight  of  distress  awakens  in  my  bosom  an 
emotion  of  pity,  as  with  that  other  pathological 
law  by  which  the  sight  of  a  red  object  impresses 
on  my  retina  the  sensation  peculiar  to  that  colour. 
Yet  the  will,  though  not  the  proximate,  may  have 
been  the  remote  and  so  the  real  cause,  both  of  the 
emotion  and  sensation  notwithstanding.  It  may 
have  been  at  the  bidding  of  my  will,  that,  instead  of 
hiding  myself,  from  my  own  flesh,  I  visited  a  scene 
of  wretchedness,  and  entered  within  the  confines 
as  it  were  of  that  pathological  influence,  in  virtue 
of  which,  after  that  the  spectacle  of  suffering  was 
seen,  the  compassion  was  unavoidable.  And  it  is 
also  at  the  bidding  of  my  will,  that  I  place  myself 
within  view  of  an  object  of  sense ;  that  I  direct  my 
eye  toward  it,  and  keep  it  open  to  that  sensation, 
which,  after  the  circumstances  that  I  have  volun¬ 
tarily  realized,  is  equally  unavoidable.  I  might 
have  escaped  from  the  full  emotion,  had  I  so  willed, 
by  keeping  aloof  from  the  spectacle  which  awaken¬ 
ed  it,  even  as  I  might  escape  from  the  sensation, 
if  I  so  will,  by  shutting  my  eyes,  or  turning  them 
aw  ay  from  the  object  which  is  its  cause ;  or,  in 
other  words,  by  the  command  which  I  have  over 
the  looking  faculty  that  belongs  to  me.  And 
perliaps  the  mind  has  a  looking  faculty  as  well  as 
the  body,  in  virtue  of  which,  as  by  the  one,  objects 
are  either  removed  from  or  made  present  to  the 
sight,  so  by  the  other  objects  may  be  either  removed 
fiom  or  made  present  to  the  thoughts.  Could 
we  ascertain  the  existence  and  operations  of  such 


176  MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIOIfS 

a  faculty  this  would  explain  how  it  is,  that  the 
emotions  are  subordinated  not  immediately  but 
mediately  to  the  will — that  the  mind,  by  the  direc¬ 
tion  of  its  looking  faculty  towards  the  counterpart 
objects,  could,  on  the  one  hand,  will  these  emotions 
into  being ;  or,  by  the  direction  of  it  away  from 
these  objects,  could,  on  the  other  hand,  will  them 
again  into  extinction.  Such  we  hold  to  be  the 
faculty  of  attention.  It  forms  the  great  link  be¬ 
tween  the  intellectual  and  moral  departments  of 
our  nature,  or  between  the  percipient  and  what 
has  already  been  named  the  pathemic  departments. 
It  is  the  control  which  the  will  has  over  this  faculty 
that  makes  man  responsible  for  the  objects  which 
he  chooses  to  entertain,  and  so  responsible  for  the 
emotions  which  pathologically  result  from  them. 

13.  We  think  that  Dr.  Brown  has  made  a 
wrong  discrimination,  when  he  speaks  of  certain  of 
the  emotions  which  involve  in  them  a  moral  feeling, 
and  certain  others  of  them  which  do  not.  There  is 
no  moral  designation  applicable  to  any  of  the  emo¬ 
tions,  viewed  nakedly  and  in  themselves.  They 
are  our  volitions,  and  our  volitions  only  w  hich  admit 
of  being  thus  characterized;  and  emotions  are  no 
further  virtuous  or  vicious,  than  as  volitions  are 
blended  with  them,  and  blended  with  them  so  far  as 
to  have  given  them  either  their  direction  or  their 
birth.  We  think  his  distinction  on  this  subject, 
fitted  most  egregiously  to  mislead  and  bewilder 
our  notions,  regarding  the  real  nature  of  virtue  in 
man.  According  to  him,  the  emotion  of  taste, 
which  arises  within  me  at  the  sight  of  beauty, 
involves  in  it  no  moral  feeling — while  the  emotion 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  177 

of  pity,  at  the  sight  of  distress,  does.  Now,  after 
the  beauty  or  the  distress  has  been  set  before  us, 
each  works  its  own  appropriate  influence  upon  our 
hearts ;  and  we  may  be  alike  passive  with  the  one 
as  with  the  other  of  them.  There  is  a  process  in 
both  that  is  strictly  pathological.  But  at  the 
same  time,  the  process  might  neither  have  begun 
nor  gone  forward,  but  by  certain  movements  of 
my  own  which  are  strictly  voluntary.  I  may  have 
travelled  to  the  scene  that  I  now  admire.  Or  1 
may  have  called  the  wretched  supplicant  into  my 
presence,  over  whom  I  now  melt  in  tenderest 
compassion.  These  two  are  acts  of  the  will ;  but 
there  is  much  in  the  subsequent  processes  which 
is  not  voluntary ;  and,  in  as  far  as  this  last  quality 
is  awanting,  in  so  far  is  the  ascription  of  any 
moral  character  equally  unsuitable  to  both.  It  is 
this  which  gives  rise  to  ambiguity.  We  do  not 
hesitate  to  aflix  the  characters  of  vice  or  virtue, 
according  as  it  may  be,  to  such  actions  as  to  give 
an  alms,  or  to  strike,  or  to  steal,  or  to  murder,  or 
to  pay  the  debts  of  equity.  But  on  what  precise 
footing  is  it,  that  we  give  the  very  same  characters 
to  such  alfections,  as  to  compassionate,  or  to  hate, 
or  to  be  angry,  or  to  experience  any  other  of  the 
sensibilities  to  which  our  pathology  has  made  us 
liable?  We  attach  a  moral  character  to  the  acts 
— because  we  see  how  these  hang  upon  the  voli¬ 
tions  which  give  them  birth ;  but  why  attach  a 
moral  character  to  the  affections,  if,  independent 
of  will,  they  take  their  rise  in  the  organic  necessi¬ 
ties  of  our  nature  ? 

14.  So  little  in  fact  may  there  be  of  a  moral 

H  2 


178  MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 

ingredient  in  the  mere  emotion,  that  from  each  of 
,two  emotions  diametrically  opposite  in  respect  of 
character,  there  may  come  forth  two  acts  on  each 
of  M'hich  the  same  kind  of  moral  delinquency  may 
he  charged.  My  eye  catches  the  sight  of  a  most 
loathsome  insect  upon  the  floor — when  I  with 
irritated  disgust,  and  to  get  rid  of  a  spectacle  so 
nauseous,  may  put  my  foot  upon  it  to  destroy  it — 
or  a  fellow  man,  under  the  sudden  visitation  of 
epilepsy  may  meet  my  view  upon  the  wayside ; 
and  I  look  on  with  sympathy,  but  with  sympathy 
so  painful,  that  I  make  my  escape  from  it,  and 
shun  the  sufferer  who  stood  urgently  in  need  of 
my  sustaining  hand.  The  hatred  and  the  sym¬ 
pathy  contrasted  as  they  are  with  each  other  are 
alike  free  of  moral  character  in  themselves;  but 
they  both  led  to  acts  that  were  reprehensible,  and 
just  because  for  the  doing  of  these  acts  there 
behoved  to  be  the  consent  of  the  will ;  and  the 
will  ought  to  have  stood  its  ground  in  the  one  case 
against  the  unnecessary  destruction  of  life,  and  in 
the  other  case  against  the  unmanly  desertion  of 
agonized  and  forlorn  helplessness.  It  would  have 
been  better,  if  the  former  had  done  with  the  object 
of  his  disgust,  what  uncle  Toby  did  with  that  fly 
which  was  the  object  of  his  tenderness,  Avho,  after 
opening  the  window  of  his  apartment,  guided  it 
onward  to  the  outer  air,  and  sent  it  forth  with  the 
benediction  that  there  is  room  in  the  world  for  me 
and  thee — and  if  the  one  had  done  against  the 
drift  and  tendency  of  his  emotion,  what  the  other 
did  because  floated  along  in  the  currency  of  his, 
the  more  resolute  must  have  been  his  will  on  the 


MORAT.ITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


179 


side  of  benevolence,  and  so  the  greater  his  moral 
triumph.  And  it  would  have  been  greatly  better, 
if  he  who  acted  the  Levite  and  passed  by  on  the 
other  side,  had  acted  the  part  of  the  good  Samari¬ 
tan — and  had  he  just  been  less  violent  with  his 
sympathy,  he  might  have  been  more  ready  with 
his  services.  The  moral  does  not  lie  in  the  sym- 
])athy ;  but  it  lies  in  the  will  prompting  the  services. 
In  his  case  the  sympathy  prevented  the  will  and 
so  did  mischief. 

15.  In  affirming  that  there  is  nothing  virtuous 
which  is  not  voluntary,  it  is  obvious,  that  we  are 
only  dealing  with  the  subjective  question  in  morals. 
We  are  considering,  not  what  that  is  which  con¬ 
stitutes  the  virtuousness  of  a  deed — this  may  be 
regarded  as  the  objective  question.  But  we  are 
considering  what  that  is  which  is  indispensable  to 
the  virtuousness  of  the  doer.  It  is  not  with  the 
act,  but  with  the  agent  that  we  are  at  present 
concerned.  And  our  first  axiom  respecting  him 
is,  that  what  he  does  cannot  be  characterized  as 
having  been  done  virtuously,  unless  it  be  done 
voluntarily.  But  there  is  a  second  axiom  as 
indisputable  as  the  first,  and  without  the  aid  of 
hich  we  should  not  be  able  to  complete  our  esti¬ 
mate  on  the  morality  of  the  emotions.  For  a 
thing  to  be  done  virtuously,  it  must  be  done  volun¬ 
tarily  ;  but  this  is  not  enough,  it  is  not  all.  It  is 
an  indispensable  condition,  but  not  the  only  con¬ 
dition.  The  other  condition  is,  that,  to  be  done 
virtuously,  it  must  be  done  because  of  its  virtuous¬ 
ness  ;  or  its  virtuousness  must  be  the  prompting 
consideration  which  led  to  the  doing  of  it.  It  i? 


180 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


not  volition  alone  which  makes  a  thing  virtuous, 
but  volition  under  a  sense  of  duty  ;  and  that  only 
is  a  moral  performance  to  which  a  man  is  urged 
by  the  sense  or  feeling  of  a  moral  obligation.  It 
may  be  done  at  the  bidding  of  inclination ;  but, 
without  this,  it  is  not  done  at  the  bidding  of  prin¬ 
ciple.  Without  this,  it  is  not  virtuous. 

16.  They  are  the  volitions,  and  the  voluntary 
deeds  which  come  out  of  them — they  are  these, 
and  these  alone,  which  form  the  proper  objects  of 
moral  censure  or  moral  approbation.  But  it  is 
not  every  sort  of  volition  that  is  moral.  I  will 
to  visit  Switzerland — and  I  may  do  it  under  the 
impulse  of  a  love  for  its  wild  and  Alpine  solitudes. 
Such  a  volition  indicates  the  man  of  taste.  Or  1 
may  be  so  fascinated  and  detained  by  the  luxury 
of  such  contemplations,  that  I  resolve  upon  an 
additional  month  of  residence  in  the  midst  of  them. 
This  too  is  a  volition  and  still  it  is  my  taste  for 
scenery  that  hath  excited  it.  In  the  course  of 
my  rambles,  I  may  enter  one  of  its  cottages,  and 
there  be  arrested  by  some  piteous  spectacle  of 
family  distress — and  when  once  seized  upon  by  the 
emotion  of  compassion,  I  might  both  prove  that  I  had 
an  eye  for  pity  and  a  hand  open  as  day  for  melting 
charity.  The  part  which  the  eye  performs  is  not 
voluntary — nor  would  we  therefore  speak  of  it  as 
serving  at  all  to  make  up  a  moral  exhibition.  The 
part  which  the  hand  performs  is  voluntary — and  yet, 
done  as  it  might  altogether  be  under  the  impulse 
of  compassion  and  of  that  alone,  there  might  even 
in  this  part  of  the  exhibition  be  nought  that  is 
Strictly  and  properly  of  a  moral  character.  It 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  181 

might  be  wholly  a  thing  of  emotion,  and  not  at  all 
a  thing  of  moral  principle.  Those  actions  which 
flow  from  taste  prove  a  man  of  taste — those  which 
flow  from  sensibility  mark  the  performer  to  be  a 
man  of  sensibility — those  to  which  he  is  driven 
under  some  headlong  impulse  of  emotion  show  him 
to  have  been  under  the  influence  of  a  resistless 
pathology — and  they  are  only  those  actions  which 
he  does  under  a  sense  of  their  moral  obligation, 
and  because  he  apprehends  them  to  be  moral,  they 
are  these  and  these  alone  which  bespeak  him  to 
De  a  man  of  virtue. 

17.  Whatever  cometh  not  of  a  sense  of  duty 
hath  no  moral  character  in  itself,  and  no  moral 
approbation  due  to  it.  The  action  we  have  already 
said  must  be  voluntary — but  it  must  be  more,  else 
there  is  no  distinction  in  regard  to  character  be¬ 
tween  one  voluntary  performance  and  another. 
Now  the  specific  distinction  of  all  those  voluntary 
actions  which  are  virtuous  is,  that  they  are  done 
because  the  performer  knows  them  to  be  virtuous, 
and  because  he  aims  in  the  doing  of  them  not  to 
do  what  he  inclines,  but  to  do  what  he  ought.  It 
may  so  happen  that  the  impulse  of  duty  and  the 
impulse  of  some  constitutional  inclination  act  to¬ 
gether  like  two  conspiring  forces — in  which  case 
the  duty  will  be  all  the  easier,  and  all  the  more 
delightful.  But  had  it  been  otherwise,  had  the 
inclination  and  the  principle  acted  adversely  and 
as  conflicting  forces,  the  latter,  if  the  result  of  the 
struggle  is  to  be  a  virtuous  action,  behoves  to 
prevail.  Even  the  cottage  scene  which  we  have 
just  now  imagined,  might,  as  it  happens,  give  rise 


182 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


either  to  the  one  or  the  other  exemplification.  It 
is  my  duty  to  do  all  the  good  I  can,  when  I  can 
do  it  without  hurt  or  hazard  to  preferable  obliga¬ 
tions — and,  consistently  with  this,  I  may  be  doing 
a  most  righteous  thing  when  I  lavish  of  my  abun¬ 
dance  on  the  widowed  mother  of  a  now  helpless  and 
desolated  family.  This  I  may  do  at  the  call  of 
principle  alone,  and  a  call  wdiich,  owing  perhaps 
to  a  most  frigid  and  immoveable  temperament, 
derived  no  aid  whatever  from  the  stirrings  of  any 
sensibility  within  me — and  here  the  sheer  rectitude 
of  the  doing,  so  to  speak,  is  exhibited  in  its  dis¬ 
tinct  and  specific  nakedness.  Or  it  may  so  happen 
that  I  do  possess  a  soft  and  susceptible  nature 
— in  which  case  the  rectitude  abides  as  it  was ;  but 
then  to  its  authoritative  call  there  is  the  re-echoing 
call  of  my  own  instinctive  humanity,  and  hence  a 
most  delightful  harmony  between  the  feelings  of 
my  heart  and  the  admonitions  of  my  conscience. 
Or,  instead  of  pity,  avarice  may  be  my  constitu¬ 
tional  propensity — and  then,  instead  of  virtue 
having  the  native  or  spontaneous  tendencies  of 
the  bosom  upon  its  side,  it  may  have  to  urge  its 
authority  against  them — and  far  greater  than  in 
the  former  case  will  be  the  triumph  of  principle, 
should  the  issue  of  the  contest  be  that  principle 
hath  carried  it.  But  lastly — and  as  a  proof  how 
all  the  emotions  may  come  under  the  like  treat¬ 
ment  at  the  hands  of  moral  rectitude,  it  is  possible 
that,  in  compliance  with  its  dictates,  one  may  at 
times  have  to  struggle  against  the  tenderness  of 
his  nature,  and  not  against  its  avarice.  The 
money  now  about  his  person,  and  which  he  would 


MORALITY  or  THE  EMOTIONS. 


183 


fain  lavish,  and  for  the  purpose  of  appeasing  his 
sensibilities  on  the  wretchedness  that  is  before  him, 
may  not  be  his  own.  He  may  be  mortgaged  to 
the  whole  extent  of  his  property— and  not  one 
farthing  might  he  be  able  to  give,  but  at  the 
expense  of  justice.  Now  it  would  be  his  duty  to 
bid  away  the  ardour  of  humanity,  or  at  least  to 
resist  its  promptings,  when  it  urged  on  the  will  to 
the  act  of  giving  what  did  not  belong  to  him — even 
as  then  it  was  his  duty  to  bid  away  the  chilling 
suggestions  of  avarice.  Yet  the  one  is  called  a 

vice _ the  other  a  virtue.  And  the  question  recurs, 

Why  are  they  so  estimated  ? 

18.  First  then,  apart  from  the  emotions  alto¬ 
gether,  there  is  a  sense  of  duty,  which  a  man  of 
steady  principle  at  all  times  carries  about  with 

him _ and  wherewith  he  is  ever  ready  to  meet  the 

occasions  of  his  life,  not  with  the  question  of  how 
do  I  at  present  feel— but  with  the  different  and 
the  distinct  question  of  what  I  at  present  ought  to 
do.  There  is  one  very  general  maxim  of  moral 
right,  and  for  which  we  have  the  acquiescence  of 
every  human  being — that  it  is  his  duty  to  do  good, 
to  do  good  if  it  lay  within  his  sphere  even  unto  all 
men ;  but  as  the  sphere  of  each  individual  is  so 
limited,  at  least  to  do  good  unto  all  men  as  he  has 
the  opportunity.  This  is  a  maxim  whose  author¬ 
ity  might  be  recognised  by  him,  even  in  his  moments 
of  abstraction  and  composure — and  when  at  the 
greatest  possible  distance  from  all  the  excitements 
to  emotion.  In  order  for  him  to  compassionate, 
or  to  have  a  generous  indignation  against  the 
yillany  that  has  been  practised  on  a  fellow-creature, 


184 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


or  to  feel  the  awakenings  of  gratitude  in  the  hosom, 
or  in  short  to  experience  any  one  of  those  emotions 
which  have  been  thought  to  involve  a  moral  feeling 
in  them,  there  must  be  some  specific  call  for  each 
of  them  in  the  circumstances  by  Mhich  he  is  sur¬ 
rounded.  But  how  many  and  how  long  often  are 
the  periods  of  his  history,  when  no  such  specific 
call  is  upon  him — yet  we  should  not  say  on  that 
account,  that  he  may  not  be  cherishing  the  very 
principles,  and  breathing  in  the  very  atmosphere 
of  virtue.  The  principle  of  well-doing  may  be 
lying  in  reserve— nay  may  be  gathering  strength 
and  ascendancy  in  his  bosom,  at  the  very  time 
when  there  is  nothing  to  be  done — and  so  we 
have  a  calm  and  steady  and  general  principle  of 
rectitude  not  actually  called,  for  the  time  being,  to 
any  service,  but  on  the  alert  to  be  called  for — and 
sure  in  that  case  by  an  instantaneous  volition,  to 
prove  how  much  his  will  is  at  the  bidding  of  his 
virtuous  principles.* 


*  We  have  already  adverted  to  the  distinction  between  the 
volition  that  has  for  its  object  some  act  to  be  done  immedi¬ 
ately,  and  the  volition  which  hath  for  its  object  either  an 
act  to  be  done  at  some  futnre  period,  or  a  course  and  habit 
of  acting.  Such  a  volition  is  called  by  Dr.  Reid,  a  fixed  pur¬ 
pose  or  resolution  with  regard  to  our  future  conduct.  They  are 
such  volitions  as  these,  in  fact,  that  have  the  greatest  effect 
upon  our  character  and  moral  conduct.  “  Suppose  a  man  to 
have  exercised  his  intellectual  and  moral  faculties,  so  far  as  to 
have  distinct  notions  of  justice  and  injustice,  and  of  the  conse¬ 
quences  of  both,  and,  after  due  deliberation,  to  have  formed  a  fixed 
purpose  to  adhere  inflexibly  to  justice,  and  never  to  handle  the 
wages  of  iniquity.  Is  not  this  the  man  whom  W'e  should  call  a 
just  man  ?  We  consider  the  moral  virtues  as  inherent  in  the 
mind  of  a  good  man,  even  when  there  is  no  opportunity  of  exer¬ 
cising  them.  And  what  is  it  in  the  mind  which  we  can  call  the 
virtue  of  justice,  when  it  is  not  exercised  ?  It  can  be  nothing 
but  a  fixed  purpose,  or  deteiiQiuafion,  to  Kct  according  to  the  rulce 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


185 


19.  In  this  state  we  might  conceive  the  intima¬ 
tion  to  come  to  him,  and  in  a  most  general  form, 
that,  by  visiting  a  certain  house,  he  would  find  an 
occasion  of  doing  good  to  one  or  more  of  his  own 
species.  Nothing  can  be  imagined  as  yet  more 

of  justice,  when  there  is  opportunity.  The  Roman  law  defined 
justice,  ‘  A  steady  and  perpeUtal  will  to  give  to  every  man  his  due.’  ” 
— “  What  has  been  said  of  justice,  may  be  so  easily  applied  to 
every  other  moral  virtue,  that  it  is  unnecessary  to  give  instances. 
They  are  all  fixed  purposes  of  acting  according  to  a  certain  rule.” 
— “  The  virtue  of  benevolence  is  a  fixed  purpose  or  resolution  to 
do  good  when  we  have  opportunity,  from  a  conviction  that  it  is 
right,  and  is  our  duty.  The  affection  of  benevolence  is  a  pro¬ 
pensity  to  do  good,  from  natural  constitution  or  habit,  without 
regard  to  rectitude  or  duty.  There  are  good  tempers  and  bad, 
which  are  a  part  of  the  constitution  of  the  man,  and  are  really 
involuntary,  though  they  often  lead  to""  voluntary  actions.” — 
“We  may  observe,  that  men  who  have  exercised  their  rational 
powers,  are  generally  governed  in  their  opinions  by  fixed  principles 
of  belief ;  and  men  who  have  made  the  greatest  advance  in  self- 
government,  are  governed  in  their  practice  by  general  fixed  pur¬ 
poses.  Without  the  former,  there  would  be  no  steadiness  and 
consistence  in  our  belief;  nor  without  the  latter,  in  our  conduct.” 
— “  A  man  of  breeding  may,  in  his  natural  temper  be  proud, 
passionate,  revengeful,  and  in  his  morals  a  very  bad  man  ;  yet,  in 
good  company,  he  can  stifle  every  passion  that  is  inconsistent  with 
good  breeding,  and  be  humane,  modest,  complaisant,  even  to 
those  whom  in  his  heart  he  despises  or  hates.  Why  is  this  man, 
who  can  command  all  his  passions  before  company,  a  slave  to 
them  in  private  ?  The  reason  is  plain.  He  has  a  fixed  resolu¬ 
tion  to  be  a  man  of  breeding,  but  hath  no  such  resolution  to  be  a 
man  of  virtue.  He  hath  combated  his  most  violent  passions  a 
thousand  times  before  he  became  master  of  them  in  company. 
The  same  resolution  and  perseverance,  would  have  given  him  the 
command  of  them  when  alone.  A  fixed  resolution  retains  its 
influence  upon  the  conduct,  even  when  the  motives  to  it  are  not 
in  view,  in  the  same  manner  as  a  fixed  principle  retains  its  influ¬ 
ence  upon  the  belief,  when  the  evidence  of  it  is  forgot.  The 
former  may  be  called  a  habit  of  the  will,  the  latter  a  habit  of  the 
under standbig," — Reid. 

We  see  how  the  virtue  of  such  a  man  is  constituted  ;  and  how 
it  resides  within  him  as  it  were,  apart  from  the  emotions.  Under  a 
fixed  purpose,  to  the  formation  of  which  he  has  been  led  by  a  sense 
of  duty,  he  might  will  to  do  all  possible  good  on  every  proper 
occasion  that  comes  before  him  for  the  exercise  of  this  principle. 


186 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


unimpressive  for  the  purpose  of  emotion  than  the 
nakedness  of  such  an  announcement — and  there¬ 
fore  nothing  more  favourable  for  the  development 
of  the  moral  principle,  when,  moving  in  its  own 
strength  alone  and  without  the  aid  of  any  accom¬ 
paniments,  it  acts  by  a  kind  of  imperative  force  on 
him  who  is  under  its  influence.  Separate  from 
the  abstract  and  general  rightness  of  a  compliance 
with  the  call,  he  as  yet  knows  of  nothing,  that, 
through  the  medium  of  his  emotions,  might  deter¬ 
mine  him  thereto.  He  knows  not  what  the  scene 
is  on  which  he  is  going  to  enter — nor  what  the  sym¬ 
pathies  which  it  is  fitted  to  awaken.  The  errand 
on  which  he  proceeds  is  altogether  one  of  general 
philanthropy ;  and  he  is  as  yet  ignorant  whether 
the  business  before  him  shall  be  to  relieve  distress, 
or  to  compose  an  unhappy  difference,  or  to  school 
a  wayward  child  into  a  compliance  with  the  will 
of  its  parents,  or  to  protect  some  helpless  victim 
of  tyranny  from  the  cruelties  of  an  unnatural  father 
or  of  a  barbarous  and  domineering  husband. 

20.  Still  however  he  goes — not  under  the  excite¬ 
ment  of  an  emotion,  but  in  compliance  with  a  prin¬ 
ciple.  He  goes  by  the  impulse  of  a  volition,  and 
of  a  moral  one  too — and  it  is  conceivable,  that  the 
scene  upon  which  he  enters  turns  out  to  be  alto¬ 
gether  similar  to  that  scene  of  cottage  wretched¬ 
ness  on  which  we  supposed  another  to  have  stum¬ 
bled  accidentally.  Each  of  these  visitors  may 
have  the  same  temperament.  Each  may  be  or¬ 
ganically  alive  to  the  same  feelings  on  the  sight  of 
distress — and  the  terminating  act  of  beneficence 
be  the  same  with  both  ;  yet  the  one  be  impregnated 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  187 

with  a  moral  quality  of  which  the  other  is  entirely, 
destitute.  The  one  has  been  surprised  by  his  con¬ 
stitutional  sympathies  into  a  deed,  for  which  the 
other  was  prepared  by  his  moral  principles.  The 
one  hath  yielded  to  influences  which  perhaps  he  did 
not  look  for.  The  other  hath  yielded  to  the  same 
influences ;  but  he  foresaw  the  probability  of 
coming  within  their  operation — and  this,  so  far 
from  repelling,  gave  new  alacrity  to  his  footsteps, 
and  hastened  him  forward  to  the  place  where  the 
work  of  benevolence  was  to  be  done.  Each  acted 
alike  under  the  emotion  of  sympathy  ;  but  they  are 
the  actings  previous  to  the  emotions  which  give  rise 
to  a  wide  moral  distinction  between  the  two  exhi¬ 
bitions.  We  must  look  first  to  the  initial  movement 
in  this  case ;  and  see  how  readily  his  first  compliance 
was  gained  from  the  one,  with  a  call  which  the  other 
perhaps  in  the  impetuous  prosecution  of  his  own 
objects  would  have  utterly  disregarded. 

21.  But  more  than  this.  There  might  not 
only  have  been  a  moral  volition  at  the  outset  of 
this  process,  and  by  which  a  leading  character  is 
given  to  the  whole  of  it — but,  during  its  continu¬ 
ance,  there  might  have  been  a  constant  blending 
of  the  principle  with  the  sympathy ;  just  as  in  cer¬ 
tain  exemplifications  that  we  have  already  given, 
there  was  a  constant  intermingling  of  the  voluntary 
with  the  pathological.  There  are  certain  emo¬ 
tions,  by  the  indulgence  of  which  pain  is  inflicted 
upon  others — and  if  beneficence  be  felt  as  a  duty, 
then,  under  a  sense  of  this  duty,  such  emotions,  if 
they  admit  of  being  effectually  resisted,  will  be 
kept  in  check.  But  there  are  certain  other  emo- 


188 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


tions  which  give  pleasure  to  those  who  are  tne 
objects  of  them ;  and,  on  the  very  same  principle, 
will  these  be  permitted  to  have  free  course ;  and, 
if  it  lie  within  the  power  of  the  will  to  foster  or  to 
perpetuate  them,  it  may  become  as  much  a  moral 
obligation  to  let  out  our  compassion  at  the  sight  of 
a  fellow  creature  in  suffering,  as  to  stretch  out 
our  hand  in  the  act  of  relieving  him.  Now  it 
requires  but  a  slight  observation  of  our  nature,  to 
know  that  a  tone  of  sympathy,  coming  forth  in 
genuine  expression  from  a  human  voice,  often 
falls  upon  the  heart  of  an  afflicted  man  with  a 
kindlier  influence,  than  ever  can  be  reached  by  all 
the  liberalities  of  wealth.  The  compassion  directly 
and  of  itself  is  an  instrument  of  relief,  apart  alto¬ 
gether  from  the  money  or  the  service  or  the  mate¬ 
rial  gift  of  any  sort  to  which  we  may  be  prompted 
by  it.  If  then  it  lie  in  any  way  with  the  will  to 
withhold  this  compassion,  or  to  put  it  forth  and 
keep  it  up  in  lively  exercise — then,  though  there 
may  be  nothing  virtuous  in  the  emotion,  still, 
consistently  with  our  great  principle,  there  runs  a 
virtue  through  that  whole  series  of  volitions  by 
which  the  emotion  is  upholden.  We  read  of  clean 
hands  and  of  diligent  hands.  If  diligence  be  a 
virtue,  it  is  a  virtue  not  properly  ascribed  to  the 
hand,  but  to  him  who  is  the  owner  of  it — and 
what  is  true  of  this  member  of  the  outer  man,  is 
no  less  true  of  all  those  passions  and  affections 
which  might  be  denominated  the  members  of  the 
inner  man.  There  is  a  pulsation  going  on  in  the 
hand  to  which  we  assign  no  moral  characteristic, 
because  pulsation  is  not  voluntary.  But  there 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


189 


may  be  a  muscular  effort  going  on  with  the  hand, 
under  the  guidance  of  the  will,  to  which  we  might 
justly  apply  the  characteristics  either  of  moral  good 
or  moral  evil.  The  man  for  example  who,  by  the 
work  of  his  own  hands,  ministers  to  his  own  neces¬ 
sities  or  to  the  service  of  his  fellows,  may  have  the 
virtue  ascribed  to  him  of  an  honest  and  upright 
independence.  But  it  were  no  violation  of  our 
customary  language,  if,  instead  of  saying  that  with 
his  hands  he  had  earned  this  proud  and  honour¬ 
able  distinction,  he  should  lift  them  up  and  say  of 
the  hands  themselves,  that  they  had  achieved  it 
for  him ;  nor  would  it  ail  mislead  us  away  from  a 
correct  understanding  of  the  matter,  if  to  them, 
though  only  the  obedient  members  of  a  virtuous 
principle,  the  testimony  of  virtue  w'as  awarded.  We 
are  all  aware  that  the  proper  and  essential  virtue 
resides  in  another  part  of  the  human  economy 
altogether,  than  in  the  members  of  the  body — and, 
in  like  manner,  it  will  be  found,  that  neither  doth 
the  virtue  which  compassion  hath  been  thought 
to  involve,  lie  in  the  emotion  itself,  but  in  that 
sense  of  duty  which  acting  by  the  will  either 
prompted  the  emotion  or  permitted  the  indulgence 

of  it.  _ 

22.  To  sum  up  these  observations.  First,  no 
action  is  virtuous  which  is  not  voluntary.  To  be 
designated  as  morally  good  or  morally  evil,  it 
must  have  had  such  a  consent  of  the  will  as 
through  the  medium  of  a  volition  led  to  the  per¬ 
formance  of  it.  But  this  circumstance  of  being 
voluntary,  though  indispensable,  is  not  enough 
for  the  moral  character  of  an  action.  Something 


190  MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS 

more  must  be  made  out  than  that  the  action  is 
wilful,  ere  we  can  assign  to  it  the  character  of 
virtue.  We  should  never  think  of  assigning  this 
character  to  an  action,  however  free  and  volun¬ 
tary,  done  for  amusement,  done  for  the  gratifica¬ 
tion  of  taste,  done  under  the  impulse  of  any  of  the 
appetites  of  our  nature.  There  are  whole  classes 
of  actions,  and  all  voluntary  too,  where  the  moral 
ingredient  is  utterly  awanting — and  the  question 
is — what  is  the  precise  thing  which  must  be  added 
to  the  description  of  an  action  that  is  voluntary, 
in  order  to  make  it  virtuous  ? 

23.  That  is  a  virtuous  action  which  a  man 
voluntarily  does  on  the  simple  ground  that  he 
ought  to  do  it.  It  is  then  said  to  be  done  on 
principle.  If  we  were  asked  for  the  impelling 
cause  within  his  heart  which  led  to  the  perform¬ 
ance,  we  should  say,  that  it  was  a  sense  of  duty. 
It  was  this  which  charged  it  upon  his  will  to  give 
out  the  proper  word  of  command,  and  it  was  this 
which  led  the  will  to  yield  its  obedience  and  issue 
forth  that  word  in  the  shape  of  a  volition— it  was 
this  which  propagated  forth  the  line  of  action, 
from  the  mechanism  of  the  inner  man,  to  the  in¬ 
struments  of  execution  that  are  placed  upon  the 
outer  man — and  the  thing  that  has  been  done  of 
consequence  we  call  virtuous,  because  willed  on 
the  consideration  that  it  was  virtuous,  and  carried 
into  effect  against  all  the  difficulties  or  the  hostile 
inclinations  that  might  have  stood  in  its  way. 

24.  Now  it  is  a  very  possible  thing  for  a  man 
to  act  under  the  impulse  of  an  emotion  that  is 
said  to  involve  a  moral  feeling  in  it,  without  this 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


191 


description  of  virtue  being  at  all  realized.  Under 
the  emotion  of  sympathy,  he  may  stretch  forth  aid 
or  alleviation  to  a  case  of  wretchedness  before 
him  ;  and  without  a  sense  of  duty  being  any  more 
concerned  in  the  process,  than  when  a  mother  of 
the  inferior  animals  yields  her  nourishment  at  the 
imploring  cry  of  her  own  young.  He  may  have 
done  it,  not  at  all  on  the  ground  that  he  ought  to 
do  it — but  because  an  unlooked  for  sentiment  of 
compassion  wherewith  he  has  been  overtaken 
urges  him  on  to  it.  He  may  do  it,  and  yet  so 
far  from  the  sense  of  what  he  ought  to  do  being 
habitually  present  or  of  habitual  prevalency — it 
may  positively  not  enter  as  a  practical  element  at 
all,  into  any  either  of  his  doings  or  of  his  delibera¬ 
tions.  The  man  wholly  adrift  from  the  restraints 
of  moral  principle,  and  wholly  exempted  from  its 
visitations,  who  perhaps  never  from  one  end  of  the 
year  to  the  other  of  it  seriously  entertains  the 
question,  what  is  the  right  or  the  incumbent  part 
in  the  matter  which  is  before  me? — whose  life  in 
fact  is  a  continual  ramble  from  one  passing  impulse 
to  another — with  whom  conscience  is  wholly  obli¬ 
terated — and  whose  only  principles  of  action  are 
the  sensitive  atfections  and  the  emotions-^we  mis¬ 
take  it,  if  we  think  not  that  a  sensibility  for  others 
even  unto  tears,  and,  what  is  more,  even  unto  the 
generosities  and  the  sacrifices  of  substantial  kind¬ 
ness,  have  not  its  turn  among  the  other  feelings 
that  sway  and  agitate  his  unregulated  bosom.  In 
regard  to  doing  as  he  ought,  this  may  never  once 
enter  as  the  consideration  upon  which  any  one 
purpose  is  either  conceived  or  executed.  He 


192  MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 

floats  along  the  tide  of  circumstances  ;  and  just 
as  w  hen  some  scene  of  loveliness  passes  before  his 
eyes,  the  responding  homage  of  admiration  might 
spontaneously  be  rendered  to  it,  and  surely  with¬ 
out  an  indication  of  virtue  on  his  part — so,  equally 
disjoined  from  virtue,  equally  apart  from  the  in¬ 
stigations  of  duty,  might  the  mere  physical  action 
of  observed  suffering  upon  his  heart,  call  back 
from  it  a  quick  and  powerful  reaction  of  sympathy 
— and  leading  him  perhaps  along  the  very  line  of 
beneficence,  which  conscience  had  it  been  awake, 
would  have  pointed  out  to  him — like  a  vessel 
without  pilotage,  which  may  take  a  direction  from 
any  accidental  breeze  and  every  current  it  meets 
with  in  its  progress,  and  be  occasionally  wafted  or 
driven  along  in  the  direction  of  its  voyage.  This 
coincidence,  however,  does  not  prove  the  guidance 
of  thought  and  intelligence  within — and  neither 
does  the  coincidence,  which  may  often  occur, 
between  that  which  principle  would  dictate  and 
that  which  pity  would  incite,  yet  prove  the  man  to 
be  under  the  authority  of  a  presiding  rectitude. 

25.  The  passions  of  men  have  been  compared 
to  the  breezes  by  which  the  vessel  is  impelled — 
and  the  moral  principle  that  regulated  him,  to  its 
wise  and  effectual  pilotage.  On  a  voyage  to  the 
West  Indies,  the  very  first  object  of  good  seaman¬ 
ship  is  to  make  as  speedily  as  possible  for  the 
region  of  the  trade  wands,  after  which  it  blow^s  in 
a  fair  direction  all  the  way.  And  one  can  con¬ 
ceive  a  management  so  slovenly,  that  this  favour¬ 
able  condition  is  never  reached ;  or,  even  if  it 
should,  that  neither  sails  are  trimmed  nor  the 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


193 


helm  so  kepf,  as  to  catch  the  best  and  steadiest 
impulse  from  the  gale.  We  know  that  there  is 
often  a  vagueness  in  analogies,  which  may  mislead 
when  they  are  designed  to  enlighten.  Bur  in  this 
instance  we  hold  the  illustration  to 'be  a  pevfect 
one,  and  fitted  to  inform  the  undsiK^stAud^  as 
well  as  to  regale  the  fancy.  In  the  Tovage  of 
benevolence,  there  may,  at  the  outset,  be  nought 
but  the  guidance  of  cool  though  determined 
Drinciple.  There  may  for  a  time  be  no  call  and 
no  excitement  to  sympathy — and  when  the  invita¬ 
tion  at  length  comes  to  some  deed  of  genencms 
service,  it  is  not  the  emotion  awakene«l  cy  any 
spectacle  of  distras^  not  yet  seen,  but  the  sense  of 
duty  that  actuates  the  will  and  impels  the  footsteps 
thitherward.  Then  it  is  that  he  comes  within 
the  operation  of  the  breeze.  It  was  duty  which 
translated  him  into  these  circumstances  ;  after  that 
feeling  lends  her  aid,  and  gives  more  alacrity  to 
all  those  dispositions  and  those  doings  which  are 
on  the  side  of  humanity.  But  he  does  not  aban¬ 
don  himself  to  the  random  force  of  his  emotions. 
He  does  not  resign  the  management  of  the  vessel, 
or  let  it  drive  even  though  in  a  fair  direction  at 
the  caprice  or  mercy  of  the  gale.  He  sits  in 
judgment  over  the  degree  and  the  drift  even  of  his 
own  sympathies.  If  he  think  them  below  the 
urgencies  of  the  occasion,  he,  as  it  were  spreads 
out  all  his  sails  that  he  may  feel  their  impulse  the 
more.  If  he  think  that  they  might  urge  him  too 
precipitately  or  waywardly  along,  then,  with  wary 
pilotage,  he  can  furl  the  canvass  into  narrower 
dimensions,  he  can  let  forth  less  of  his  mind  to  th® 
VOL.  V,  I 


194  MORALITV  r)F  THE  EMOTION'S. 

emotions  that  might  else  hurry  him  forvvard  into 
the  transports  of  violence  and  excess — he  ought 
not  perhaps  to  make  an  entire  escape  from  that 
region  of  pathology  upon  which  he  has  entered ; 
— but  the  same  will  which  brought  him  there,  can 
mix  and  effectually  too  its  volitions  with  the  influ¬ 
ences  to  which  it  nov\'  stands  exposed — and,  if 
under  the  control  of  moral  principle,  it  fosters  the 
sensibilities  of  the  heart  when  it  ought  and 
restrains  them  when  it  ought. 

26.  We  already  understand  how  the  will  can 
give  such  an  impulse  to  the  person,  as  to  bring  us 
within  the  sight  and  observation  of  distress — so 
that  even  though  after  this  was  brought  about  the 
will  resigned  its  office,  and  the  emotions  took  their 
own  unregulated  ascendancy  over  the  spirit,  yet 
ail  the  good  which  they  prompt  and  lead  to  the 
performance  of,  though  immediately  reducible  into 
feelings  which  have  no  virtue  in  themselves,  may 
be  traced  remotely  to  an  act  of  virtue.  There  is 
an  exceeding  good  phrase  in  Scripture  that  is 
expressive  of  this  first  step  in  the  process  to  which 
we  refer — when  we  are  told  that  a  man  should  not 
hide  himself  from  his  own  flesh.  He  who  thus 
hides  himself,  let  his  temperament  be  as  soft  and 
susceptible  as  it  may,  keeps  back  from  society  all 
the  benefit  that  else  might  flow  upon  it  through 
the  medium  of  his  sympathies — ^just  liy  keeping 
aloof  from  the  objects  that  would  awaken  them. 
He  does  not  get  forward  in  the  voyage  of  philan¬ 
thropy,  because  he  will  not  enter  into  the  region 
of  the  trade  winds.  He  will  not  so  manaire  his 
vessel  as  to  place  himself  in  the  way  of  a  favour 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


195 


able  breeze — or  work  it  onward  to  that  current, 
which,  almost  without  another  effort  on  his  part, 
would  bear  him  along  to  the  very  point  of  attain 
ment  which  is  most  desirable. 

27.  Hitherto  the  influence  of  the  will  upon  the 
emotions,  lies  in  that  initial  act,  by  which  a  man, 
knowingly  and  voluntarily,  transports  himself 
within  the  sphere  of  their  operations ;  and  for  the 
very  purpose  too  of  yielding  himself  to  every  im¬ 
pulse  that  he  approves  of.  The  influence  of  the 
will  is  anterior  to  the  emotions.  But  it  has  an 
influence  also  among  the  emotions,  and  after  they 
have  begun  their  play  upon  the  heart.  We  find 
how  it  is  that  by  a  voluntary  and  a  virtuous  action, 
or  even  series  of  actions,  the  man  may  get  the 
whole  mechanism  of  his  sentient  and  moral  nature 
transported  within  the  region  of  the  trade  winds — 
hut,  beside  this,  there  are  virtuous  and  voluntary 
efforts  by  which  he  trims  and  accommodates  his 
vessel,  so  as  to  turn  their  impulse  upon  it  to  the 
best  advantage.  So  that  not  only  may  the  volun¬ 
tary  come  before  the  pathological  and  even  origi¬ 
nate  it.  But  the  voluntary  may  intermingle  with 
the  pathological,  so  as  not  merely  to  stamp  a 
character  of  moral  worth  on  the  origin  of  the  pro¬ 
cess,  but  so  as  to  sustain  this  character  through¬ 
out  all  the  successive  steps  of  it. 

28.  To  understand  how  this  might  be,  let  it  he 
observed,  that  the  first  effect  of  our  attention  is 
the  brightening  of  that  object  to  which  it  is  direc¬ 
ted,  or  rather  the  clearer  view  which  we  ourselves 
acquire  of  it.  There  is  not  a  greater  quantity  of 
light  upon  that  which  we  are  looking  to ;  but  the 


196  MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 

look  itself  makes  the  same  quantity  of  light  serve 
the  purpose  of  a  more  distinct  and  luminous  per¬ 
ception.  The  effect  however  is  the  same  as  if, 
actually,  a  greater  lustre  were  diffused  over  the 
external  thing,  that  we  are  employed  in  regarding; 
and  it  is  worthy  of  remark,  that,  in  this  respect, 
there  is  a  similarity,  not  merely  with  regard  to  the 
object  upon  which  we  gaze,  but  to  all  the  other 
objects  within  the  field  of  vision,  and  which  are 
diffused  around  it.  All  are  aware  of  the  effect 
which  the  actual  brightening  of  any  visible  thing 
has  upon  the  other  visible  things,  that  are  spread 
about  on  the  field  of  contemplation.  It  makes 
them  less  visible.  A  full  and  unclouded  moon 
throws  into  greater  dimness  all  those  lesser  lights 
that  spangle  the  canopy  of  heaven ;  and  they  fade 
away  from  observation  altogether,  under  the  over¬ 
powering  splendour  of  a  still  more  intense  lumi¬ 
nary.  Now  attention  has  this  very  effect  on  the 
objects  that  are  not  attended  to.  It  makes  greatly 
more  perceivable  than  before  the  one  which  it  has 
selected  and  fastened  upon ;  and  all  the  others 
fade  away  into  comparative  dimness,  and  perhaps 
even  though  impressed  on  the  retina  as  before, 
have  ceased  to  be  things  of  conscious  observation. 
It  is  thus  that  when  the  mind  is  riveted  on  some 
one  object  of  thought,  its  owner  often  becomes 
insensible  to  present  things.  They  make  as  little 
impression  upon  him,  as  if  they  were  absent ;  but, 
as  absence  cannot  be  charged  upon  them,  our 
language  hath  taken  the  liberty  of  charging  it 
upon  himself — for  it  is  to  the  state  of  his  mind, 
that  an  effect  similar  to  that  of  absence  is  owing. 


MORAI-ITY  or  THE  EMOTIONS. 


197 


It  is  a  very  fair  deviation,  certainly,  from  the 
primary  meaning  of  the  word ;  and  we  may  thus 
understand  how  it  is  that  the  disappearance  of  the 
stars  on  the  approach  of  day,  a  disappearance  as 
complete  as  if  there  had  been  an  utter  extinction, 
of  them,  might  be  employed  to  illustrate  the  fact, 
that  other  things  are  scarcely  if  at  all  seen  or 
thought  of  when  the  mind  fastens  upon  one 
object,  and,  without  any  shedding  of  luminous 
matter  upon  it,  exerts  all  the  power  of  illumina¬ 
tion  by  the  steady  and  unfaltering  gaze  which  is 
directed  towards  it. 

29.  It  has  been  well  remarked  by  Dr.  Brown, 
that,  if  there  be  emotion  of  any  sort  associated 
with  an  object,  that  not  merely  is  a  call  for  our 
attending  to  it ;  but  it  has  the  effect  of  making  our 
perception  of  it  greatly  more  quick  and  vivid  than 
it  otherwise  would  be.  The  desire  of  doing  our 
duty  then  will,  not  only  direct  our  attention  to  the 
object  which  presents  us  with  the  opportunity  of 
this  high  fulfilment ;  but  it  will  make  us  more 
quicksighted,  and  give  us  a  far  more  vivid  dis¬ 
cernment  of  it  than  we  otherwise  should  have  had. 
Even  the  general  report  of  a  service  that  might  be 
done  to  humanity,  will,  to  a  man  who  feels  the 
obligation  of  it,  be  the  signal  for  arresting  as  it 
were  his  notice;  and,  out  of  the  multitude  of 
objects  which  at  all  times  float  in  a  kind  of  shifting 
panorama  over  the  eye  of  his  mind,  and  all  of 
which  he  may  be  said  to  see — this  is  the  object  of 
thought  to  which  he  will  look,  and  that  on  the 
impulse  of  a  volition  to  which  he  has  been  promp¬ 
ted  just  by  his  sense  of  duty— -just  because  there  is 


198 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


in  him  that  which  enters  into  the  definition  of  a  virtu¬ 
ous  man — just  because  there  is  what  Dr.  Reid  would 
call  a  fixed  resolution ;  and  what,  in  the  language 
of  the  Roman  law  is  called  a  steady  and  perpetual 
will  within  him,  on  the  side  of  beneficence.  To 
talk  as  yet  of  his  emotion  of  sympathy  with  dis¬ 
tress,  is  just  as  preposterous  as  to  talk  of  the  felt 
pathos  of  a  musical  air,  ere  we  have  come  within 
reach  of  the  hearing  of  it.  As  yet  the  man’s  only 
emotion  is  that  of  a  desire  to'  do  his  duty. 
Under  the  power  of  it  other  objects,  that  might 
else  have  been  urging  them  with  their  solicitations, 
are  more  dimly  perceived  by  him,  and  have  a 
fainter  influence  on  his  feelings  and  purposes. 
The  calls  of  amusement  or  of  business  that  deafen 
this  call  of  duty  with  other  men,  sink  into  impo- 
tency — and  that  because  of  the  overbearing  effi¬ 
cacy,  wherewith  it  tells  on  the  attention  of  him, 
who  hath  made  the  object  of  doing  that  which  is 
right,  an  object  which  his  ambition  is  constantly 
and  supremely  set  upon.  Under  the  operation  ol 
this  principle,  he  is  guided  onward,  till  he  come 
within  reach  of  that  pathetic  influence  that  had 
no  operation  whatever  on  the  initial  footsteps 
of  the  process — till  he  come  within  the  hearing  of 
that  piteous  cry,  or  the  sight  of  that  imploring 
countenance,  that  now  bring  his  feelings  into  play. 
Then  it  is  true  that  there  is  a  pathology  which 
mingles  and  combines  with  the  principle — an 
augmented  vivacity  of  emotion  which  concentrates 
the  regards  upon  its  objects  still  more  Intensely 
than  before — a  more  impressive  exhibition  of  that 
object  in  consequence,  and  along  with  it  a  com- 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


199 


parative  insensibility  to  all  the  accompaniments  of 
this  scene  of  wretcliedness  or  to  ought  in  tact  but 
the  wretchedness  itself.  And  here  we  may  ob¬ 
serve  what  that  is  which  constitutes  the  test  and 
the  triumph  of  principle ;  and  how  it  stands,  supe¬ 
rior  and  apart,  from  all  the  instinctive  susceptibi¬ 
lities  of  our  nature.  In  the  midst  of  such  a  scene, 
let  the  mere  man  of  emotion  be  exposed  to  all  its 
influences ;  and,  along  with  that  which  is  fitted  to 
draw  forth  his  sympathy,  it  is  a  possible  and  a 
frequent  thing  that  he  should  meet  with  that  which 
draws  forth  his  most  sensitive  aversion.  There 
may  be  filth,  and  disorder,  and  all  those  nauseous 
and  disgusting  circumstances  which  so  often  meet 
too-ether  in  the  hovel  of  a  reckless  and  ill-condi¬ 
tioned  family.  There  may  be  sights,  and  smells, 
and  the  stiflings  of  a  heated  and  confined  atmo¬ 
sphere  before  which  there  is  many  an  elegant 
sentimentalist,  who  could  weep  wdth  very  tender¬ 
ness  ov'er  a  scene  of  fictitious  distress  whei  e  all 
these  revolting  accompaniments  are  kept  studiously 
away;  but  who,  when  called  to  brave  the  realities 
wherewith  the  hand  of  nature  and  experience  hath 
mixed  up  an  exhibition  for  the  rough  but  whole¬ 
some  discipline  of  human  virtue,  could  not  stand 
his  ground.  And  in  addition  to  all  those  offences 
wherewith  the  outer  organs  of  the  visitor  are 
grated  and  agonized,  there  may  be  moral  anti¬ 
pathies  besides  which  are  far  more  insupportable. 
There  may  be  the  hoarse  murmurs  of  ingratitude. 
There  may  be  the  dark  scowl  of  suspicion  and 
discontent,  d  here  may  be  the  tone  of  inso.ent 
demand,  instead  of  the  loiid  and  w".r.niiig  accents 


200 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


of  supplication.  There  may  be  the  hardihood  of 
a  cold  and  fierce  and  disdainful  household ;  and, 
even  when  we  turn  to  the  bed  of  the  dying  man, 
there  may  be  pictured  forth  in  every  look  and 
every  lineament,  the  depravity  that  he  has  nour¬ 
ished  through  life — and  whose  fixed  and  sullen 
aspect,  though  now  on  the  brink  of  eternity,  he 
cannot  bid  away.  It  is  the  art  of  the  irovelist  to 
divest  the  pathetic  representation  of  all  that  can 
disturb  the  current  of  sensibility,  and  thus  to  over¬ 
power  the  reader  into  a  flood  of  tenderness.  But 
in  the  scenes  of  actual  experience,  things  are 
differently  ordered;  and,  mingled  with  the  pro¬ 
vocatives  to  sympathy,  are  there  provocatives  to 
offend  and  to  irritate  and  to  annoy.  And  it  is  a 
matter  of  chance,  how  a  man  of  mere  emotion, 
and  nothing  else,  will  acquit  himself  among  the 
warring  elements.  But  the  man  of  principle 
weathers  every  difficulty  and  every  discourage¬ 
ment;  and  the  same  sense  of  duty  which  brought 
him  there,  bears  him  up  under  an  exposure  that 
would  wither  the  frail  and  fluctuating  sympathies 
of  other  men. 

30.  And  the  principle  is  that  he  shall  do  all 
the  good  he  can.  This  associates  a  desire  with 
the  wretchedness  that  is  before  him.  The  desire 
fastens  his  attention  on  that  one  object — the 
misery  which  he  hath  come  to  visit,  and  to  minis¬ 
ter  unto.  The  attention  gives  him  a  more  vivid 
discernment  of  its  object;  and  in  proportion  as 
he  gazes  more  intensely  on  the  manifestations  of 
a  sentient  creature  in  distress — in  that  proportion 
does  he  gather  upon  his  heart  the  appropriat«' 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


201 


influence  of  such  an  exhibition  on  the  sensibilities 
wherewith  Nature  hath  endowed  us.  But  more 
than  this — in  analogy  with  the  laws  and  phenomena 
of  attention — the  more  singly  and  exclusively  that 
he  looks  on  the  wretchedness  before  him,  the  less 
is  he  alive  to  the  impression  of  the  other  accom¬ 
paniments.  T  hey  fade  away,  as  it  were,  from  his 
observation ;  and  leave  him  to  the  entire  power  of 
that  one  emotion,  which  the  one  steadfast  object  of 
his  regard  is  fittfed  to  awaken.  His  principle  alone 
would  have  achieved  for  him  the  victory.^  But  it  is 
well  that  the  very  strength  of  his  principle,  by  con¬ 
centrating  his  view  on  the  moving  object  before 
him,  secures  a  larger  accession  to  that  pity  which 
aids  him  in  the  contest.  This  is  altogether  a 
beautiful  provision.  The  attention  of  the  man 
who  is  actuated  by  duty,  is  fastened  on  the  wretch¬ 
edness  that  seeks  to  be  relieved  by  him.  He 
thus  sees  that  object  more  impressively ;  and  its 
appropriate  emotion,  which  is  a  powerful  auxiliary 
to  the  sense  of  duty,  is  made  stronger  than  at 
the  first.  But  in  the  very  proportion  that  his 
attention  is  thus  engaged,  is  it  withdrawn  fi  om  those 
other  objects  which  go  so  much  to  stifle  and  to 
repel  the  sympathies  of  ordinary  men.  The  emo¬ 
tions  correspondent  to  these  other  objects  are 
weakened ;  and  so  as  principle  perseveres,  the 
sensibility  which  is  upon  its  side  gains  new 
strength,  and  the  sensibilities  which  are  opposed 
to  it  offer  a  fainter  and  a  feebler  resistance.  It  is 
thus  that  as  the  final  result  of  principle  the  pity 
survives  every  adverse  influence  that  might  have 
extinguished  or  put  it  to  flight ;  and  the  virtue, 

I  2 


202 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


which  should  he  ascribed  to  a  sense  of  rectitude 
alone,  is  transferred  to  the  sensibility  that  was 
nourished  and  upheld  by  it. 

31.  But  more  than  this.  The  man  who  has 
long  been  practised  to  benevolent  intercourse  with 
his  fellows,  is  well  aware  that  the  great  charm  of 
human  kindness  lies  in  the  kindness  itself,  and  not 
in  any  gift  or  service  which  has  been  prompted 
by  it.  So  have  we  been  constituted  by  our 
Maker,  that,  clearer  far  to  the  bosom  of  the 
afflicted  than  the  money  which  is  dropped  by  the 
hand  of  the  benefactor,  is  the  mercy  that  beams 
upon  him  from  his  countenance.  There  is  the 
materiel  of  benevolence — made  up  of  food  to  the 
hungry,  and  raiment  to  the  naked  and  other  tan¬ 
gible  supplies  suited  to  various  physical  necessi¬ 
ties  of  our  species.  But  by  far  its  most  exqui¬ 
site,  and  we  may  add  too  its  most  substantial 
charm,  lies  in  the  morale  of  benevolence — in  the 
balsam  that  flows  direct  from  the  pity  of  one 
heart  to  the  anguish  of  anctiier — in  that  law  of 
reciprocal  affinity  which  obtains  between  soul  and 
soul ;  and,  in  virtue  of  which,  when  the  one  is  in 
distress,  a  manifested  sympathy  is  far  the  most 
acceptable  medicine  which  the  other  can  pour 
into  it.  The  effect  of  suffering  to  call  forth  sym¬ 
pathy,  and  the  effect  of  sympathy  back  again  to 
act  as  an  emollient  upon  suffering,  is  one  of  those 
established  processes  in  the  economy  of  Nature, 
by  which  the  ills  of  humanity  are  alleviated.  Now 
there  is  a  thorough  consciousness  of  this  with  each 
of  the  parties  ;  and  more  particularly  he,  whose 
office  it  is  to  act  the  benefactor,  aware 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


203 


mighty  power  to  soothe  and  to  gladden  that  lies 
in  sympathy  alone,  knows  that  it  is  kindness  to 
put  it  forth,  and  that  it  were  cruelty  to  withhold  it. 
Now  what  effect  ought  this  to  have  on  the  man 
who,  under  a  sense  of  duty,  is  actuated  by  the 
principle  of  doing  the  -uttermost  good  within  his 
reach — ^now  when  he  sees  that  as  much  good  is 
done  by  the  manifested  emotion  itself,  as  by  the 
deed  of  generosity  to  which  the  emotion  urges  him 

_ that  as  great  a  blessing  descends  upon  the 

sufferer,  by  the  heart  putting  forth  upon  him  its 
direct  sympathy,  as  by  the  hand  putting  forth  upon 
him  its  direct  service — that,  even  without  the  vehicle 
of  any  material  dispensation  whatever,there  is  a  felt 
graciousness  on  the  part  of  an  afflicted  man,  in  the 
simple  juxtaposition  of  one  who  is  sitting  at  his 
side,  and  perhaps  can  do  nothing  but  weep  for 

him _ insomuch  that  even  in  the  visit  of  him  who  is 

hoth  poor  and  feeble,  who  hath  no  strength  to 
serve  and  no  succour  to  bestow,  there  is,  in  the 
honest  sympathy  of  his  bosom,  what  a  man 

acquainted  with  grief  feels  to  be  the  best  of  palli¬ 
atives.  It  is  with  such  views  and  convictions  as 

these,  that  he  who  goeth  forth  on  the  errand  of 

benevolence,  knows  that  the  mere  sensibility  is 
one  of  the  most  powerful  of  its  instruments ;  and 
the  heart  which  pours  it  forth  in  the  looks  and  the 
language  of  tenderness,  renders  as  substantial  a 
service  to  the  unhappy,  as  the  hand  that  is 

stretched  forth  to  relieve  them.  And  so  he  is 
guided  to  the  object  of  fostering  this  compassion, 
just  as  directly  as  he  is  guided  to  the  object  of 
doing  all  personal  service.  In  the  one  performanc.e. 


204 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


the  hand  has  to  uphold  its  diligence  ;  and  to  bear 
itself  up  under  the  fatigues  that,  but  for  the  stim¬ 
ulus  of  a  great  moral  necessity,  would  have  been 
apt  to  paralyze  it.  And  in  like  manner  the  heart 
has  to  uphold  its  sympathy,  and  to  bear  itself  up 
under  the  adverse  emotions  of  disgust  or  dissatis¬ 
faction  that,  but  for  the  stimulus  of  those  sufferings 
which  challenge  all  its  tenderness,  would  have  put 
the  sympathy  to  flight.  The  one  is  just  as  much 
an  instrument  as  the  other.  The  heart  and  the 
hand  are  alike  pressed  into  the  service  of  benevo¬ 
lence,  under  the  guidance  and  at  the  bidding  of 
virtuous  principle.  We  should  not  say  of  the 
virtue  that  it  lay  in  the  mechanism  of  the  hand, 
but  in  that  volition  which  impressed  its  movements. 
Neither  should  we  say  of  the  virtue  that  it  lay  in 
the  organization  of  the  heart,  but  in  that  series  of 
volitions  by  which  it  was  kept  under  the  influence 
that  first  awoke  and  that  now  perpetuates  its 
emotions. 

32,  And  now  we  have  only  to  attend  to  the 
important  function  which  the  attention  has  to  per¬ 
form  in  this  process  ;  and  how,  through  the  inter¬ 
vention  of  this  faculty,  though  there  be  no  virtue 
in  the  emotions  themselves,  there  has  a  very  high 
virtue  been  concerned  in  the  work  of  upholding 
them.  But  for  the  steady  attention  directed  to 
the  one  object  of  a  creature  in  distress,  the  heart 
would  have  lain  open  to  the  counteraction  of  a 
thousand  adverse  influences.  The  whole  man 
might  have  sunk  under  the  weariness  of  those 
manifold  assiduities  wherewith  many  a  sickbed 
hath  to  be  plied  constantly.  Or,  in  the  disgust 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


205 


and  the  discomfort  of  one’s  offended  sensations, 
the  patience  might  have  been  utterly  exhausted. 
Or,  even  in  the  peevishness  and  the  unthankful¬ 
ness  of  him  to  whom  we  had  purposed  to  devote 
the  philanthropy  of  many  weeks,  we  may  at  length 
have  been  disheartened  out  of  all  our  perseverance. 
In  a  word,  had  nought  but  the  emotions  been 
concerned  in  this  process,  there  would  just  have 
been  the  collision  of  one  element  against  another, 
and  there  would  have  been  a  physical  necessity 
for  the  prevalence  of  one  of  them.  But,  in  addi¬ 
tion  to  these,  there  is  a  moral  sense  in  our  nature 
distinct  from  the  emotions  and  which  claims  the 
ascendancy  over  them  all — which  stirs  within  us, 
not  on  the  impulse  of  what  we  feel,  but  on  the 
,  principle  of  what  we  ought — to  which  the  emotions, 
in  fact,  are  only  so  many  ministers — and  which 
through  the  medium  of  the  attention  directed  to 
such  objects  as  it  wills,  can  call  forth  one  emotion 
into  action  and  strike  an  impotency  on  all  the 
rest. 

33.  It  is  this  which  imparts  virtuousness  to 
emotion,  even  though  there  be  nothing  virtuous 
vdiich  is  not  voluntary.  It  is  true  that  once  the 
idea  of  an  object  is  in  the  mind,  its  counterpart 
emotion  may,  by  an  organic  or  pathological  law, 
have  come  unbidden  into  the  heart.  The  emotion 
may  have  come  unbidden  ;  but  the  idea  may  not 
have  come  unbidden.  By  an  act  of  the  will,  it 
may,  in  the  way  now  explained,  have  been  sum¬ 
moned  at  the  first  into  the  mind’s  presence ;  and 
at  all  events  it  is  by  a  continuous  act  of  the  will 
that  it  is  detained  and  dwelt  upon.  The  will  is 


206 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


not  in  contact  with  the  emotion,  but  it  is  in  con¬ 
tact  with  the  idea  of  that  object  which  awakens 
the  emotion — and  therefore,  although  not  in 
contact  with  the  emotion,  it  may  be  vested  with 
an  effectual  control  over  it.  It  cannot  bid  com¬ 
passion  into  the  bosom,  apart  from  the  object 
which  awakens  it ;  but  it  can  bid  a  personal  entry 
into  the  house  of  mourning,  and  then  the  com¬ 
passion  will  flow  apace ;  or  it  can  bid  a  mental 
conception  of  the  bereaved  and  afflicted  family 
there,  and  then  the  sensibility  will  equally  arise, 
whether  a  suffering  be  seen  or  a  suffering  be 
thought  of.  In  like  manner,  it  cannot  bid  into 
the  breast  the  naked  and  unaccompanied  feeling 
of  gratitude ;  but  it  can  call  to  recollection,  and 
keep  in  recollection,  the  kindness  which  prompts 
it — and  the  emotion  follows  in  faithful  attendance 
on  its  counterpart  object.  It  is  thus  that  w'e  can 
will  the  right  emotions  into  being,  not  immedi¬ 
ately  but  mediately — as  the  love  of  God,  by  think¬ 
ing  on  God — a  sentiment  of  friendship  by  dwelling 
in  contemplation  on  the  congenial  qualities  of  our 
friend — the  admiration  of  moral  excellence,  by 
means  of  a  serious  and  stedfast  attention  to  it.  It 
is  thus  too  that  we  bid  away  the  wrong  emotions, 
not  separately  and  in  disjunction  from  their  ob¬ 
jects,  for  the  pathological  law  which  unites  objects 
with  emotions  we  cannot  break  asunder ;  but  we 
rid  our  heart  of  the  emotions,  by  ridding  our  mind 
of  their  exciting  and  originating  thoughts ;  of 
anger,  for  example,  by  forgetting  the  injury;  or 
of  a  licentious  instigation,  by  dismissing  from  our 
fancy  the  licentious  image,  or  turning  our  sight 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


207 


and  our  eyes  from  viewing  vanity.  It  is  this 
command  of  the  will  over  the  attention,  which, 
transmuting  the  intellectual  into  the  moral,  makes 
duties  of  heedfulness  and  consideration — and 
duties  too  of  prime  importance,  because  of  the 
place  which  attention  occupies  in  the  mental 
system,  as  the  great  ligament  between  the  perci¬ 
pient  and  the  pathematic  parts  of  our  nature.  It  is 
by  its  means  that  the  will  is  made  to  touch  at 
least  the  springs  of  emotion — if  it  do  not  touch 
the  emotions  themselves.  The  will  tells  on  the 
sensibilities,  through  an  intermediate  machinery 
which  has  been  placed  at  its  disposal ;  and  thus  it 
is,  that  the  culture  or  regulation  of  the  heart  is 
mainly  dependent  on  the  regulation  of  the  thoughts. 

34.  We  may  thus  be  enabled  to  explain  the 
force  and  inveteracy  of  habit ;  and  that  not  by  the 
power  of  emotions  to  suggest  emotions,  but  purely 
by  the  power  of  thoughts  to  suggest  thoughts.*  In 
this  process,  the  emotions  will  of  course  intermingle 
with  their  own  counterpart  thoughts ;  and  both 
ideas  and  feelings  will  succeed  each  other  in  their 
customary  trains  all  the  more  surely,  the  oftener  they 
have  been  suffered  to  pass  unbroken  by  any  inter¬ 
vention  of  the  will,  any  remonstrance  from  the  voice 


*  While  we  would  thus  confine  suggestion  to  the  succession  of 
our  thoughts,  and  regard  it  as  an  improper  extension  of  the  term 
when  applied  to  the  succession  of  our  feelings — we  mean  not  to 
resolve  the  phenomena  of  habit  wholly  into  suggestion,  or  to  deny 
the  effect  of  repeated  indulgence  on  the  subjective  mind,  both  in 
adding  to  its  susceptibilities  and  weakening  its  powers  of  resist¬ 
ance.  It  is  thus  that  each  vicious  indulgence  carries  its  own 
moral  penalty  along  with  it ;  and  the  soul  because  the  victim  of 
passions  which  it  has  fostered  into  tyrannic  strength,  is  “  filled 
with  the  fruit  of  its  own  ways.” 


208 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


of  conscience.  It  is  in  this  way  that  the  MTetched 
voluptuary,  becomes  every  year  the  more  helpless 
victim  of  his  own  depraved  inclinations — because 
more  and  more  lorded  over  by  those  foul  imagina¬ 
tions,  which  are  lighted  up  to  him,  from  almost 
every  object  he  sees  or  thinks  of ;  and  which  now 
he  scarcely  has  the  power,  because  he  never  had 
the  honest  or  sustained  will  to  bid  away.  That 
may  truly  be  called  a  moral  chastisement  under 
which  he  suffers.  The  more  he  has  sinned,  the 
more  helpless  is  the  necessity  under  which  he  lies 
of  sinning — a  bondage  strengthened  by  every  act 
of  indulgence,  till  he  may  become  the  irrecover¬ 
able  slave  of  those  passions  which  war  against  the 
principles  of  a  better  and  higher  nature.  And 
when  he  is  domineered  over  by  passions,  he  is 
domineered  over  by  thoughts ;  and  though  there 
must  be  a  subjective  change  for  the  renovation  of 
the  mind — this  does  not  supersede  the  necessity  of 
counteracting  thoughts,  by  the  force  or  mastery  of 
which  it  is  that  the  spell  is  broken,  or  of  an  intellec¬ 
tual  medium  by  which  the  moral  distemper  might 
be  cleared  away.  In  other  words  if  he  be  rescued 
from  his  delusions  to  sobriety  and  virtue,  ideas  will 
be  the  stepping  stones  of  his  returning  path — the 
sirens  that  will  recall  him  to  himself,  by  chasing 
away  the  fascinations  wherewith  he  is  encompassed. 
The  percipient  part  of  his  nature  must  be  set  right, 
ere  the  pathological  part  of  it  can  become  whole. 
To  behave  himself  aright,  he  must  bethink  himself 
aright ;  and  noble  recoveries  have  been  effected, 
even  from  most  deep  and  hopeless  infatuation, 
simply  by  the  power  of  thoughts — when  made  to 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


209 


dwell  on  the  distress  of  friends  the  poverty  and 
distress  of  children,  the  ruin  of  health  as  well  as 
fortune,  the  displeasure  of  an  angry  God,  the 
horrors  of  an  unprovided  death-bed  or  an  undone 
eternity.* 

35.  This  connexion  between  the  emotions  anc. 
their  objects  is  of  first  importance — because  of  the 
alliance  which  it  establishes  between  the  intellec¬ 
tual  and  the  moral  departments  of  our  nature. 
We  often  speak  of  the  pleasure  that  we  receive 
from  one  class  of  the  emotions,  as  those  of  taste — 
of  the  danger  or  disagreeableness  of  another,  as 
anger,  or  fear,  or  envy — of  the  obligation  that  lies 
upon  us  to  cherish  and  retain  certain  other  emo¬ 
tions,  insomuch  that  the  designation  of  virtuous 
is  generally  given  to  them,  as  gratitude,  and  com¬ 
passion,  and  the  special  love  of  relatives  or  coun¬ 
try,  and  in  one  word,  all  the  benevolent  affections 
of  our  nature.  Now  however  obvious  when  stated, 
it  is  not  sufficiently  adverted  to,  even  when  study¬ 
ing  the  philosophy  of  the  subject,  and  still  less  in 
the  practical  government  and  regulation  of  the 
heart — that  for  the  full  presence  and  effect  of  each 
of  these  specific  emotions  in  the  heart,  there  must 
a  certain  appropriate  and  counterpart  object, 


*  We  may  here  remark  how  strikingly  accordant  the  philoso¬ 
phy  of  our  nature  is  with  the  lessons  of  the  Gospel,  in  regard  to 
the  reciprocal  acting  of  its  moral  and  intellectual  parts  on  each 
other — -and  that  not  merely  in  what  Scripture  enjoins  on  the 
management  of  temptations;  but  in  its  frequent  affirmation,  as  a 
general  and  reigning  principle,  of  the  power  which  its  objective 
doctrines  have  in  transforming  the  subjective  mind  which  receives 
them — exemplified  in  such  phrases,  as  “  being  sanctified  by  the 
truth”  and  “  keeping  our  hearts  in  the  love  of  God,  by  building 
ourselves  up  in  our  most  holy  faith.” 


210 


MORALITY  uF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


whether  through  the  channel  of  sense  or  of  the 
memory,  be  present  to  the  thoughts.  We  feel  the 
emotion  of  beauty,  in  the  act  of  beholding  or  con¬ 
ceiving  a  beautiful  object ;  an  'emotion  of  terror, 
in  the  view  of  some  danger  which  menaces  us ;  an 
emotion  of  gratitude,  iivthe  recollection  of  a  past 
kindness,  or  of  the  benefactor  who  conferred  it. 
Such  then  is  the  dependence  between  perception 
and  feeling,  that,  without  the  one,  the  other  is  not 
fully  awakened.  Present  an  object  to  the  view  of 
the  mind,  and  the  emotion  suited  to  that  object, 
whether  it  be  love  or  resentment  or  terror,  or 
disgust,  do  consequently  arise;  just  as,  on  pre¬ 
senting  visible  things  of  different  colour  to  the 
eye,  the  green  and  red  and  yellow  and  blue  im¬ 
press  their  different  and  peculiar  sensations  on 
the  retina.  It  is  very  obvious  that  the  sensations 
owe  their  being  to  the  external  objects,  without 
the  presence  and  the  perception  of  which  they 
could  not  possibly  have  arisen.  x4nd  it  should  by 
alike  obvious,  that  the  emotions  owe  their  being 
to  a  mental  perception,  whetlier  by  sense  or  be 
memory,  of  the  objects  which  are  fitted  to  awaken 
them.  Let  an  object  be  introduced  to  the  notice 
of  the  mind,  and  its  correlative  emotion  instantly 
arises  in  the  heart ;  let  the  object  be  forgotten  or 
disappear  from  the  mental  view,  and  the  emotion 
disappears  along  witli  it. 

36.  We  deem  it  no  exception  to  the  invariable¬ 
ness  of  that  relation  which  subsists  between  an 
object  and  its  counterpart  emotion,  that,  in  many 
instances,  a  certain  given  object  may  be  present 
and  in  full  view  of  the  observer,  without  awaken- 


MOIIALITY  OT  THE  EMOTIONS, 


211 


ing  that  sensibility  which  is  proper  to  it.  A 
spectacle  of  pain  does  generally,  but  not  always, 
awaken  compassion.  It  would  always,  we  think, 
if  a  creature  in  agony  were  the  single  object  of  the 
mind’s  contemplation.  But,  the  person,  now  in 
suffering,  may  be  undergoing  the  chastisement  of 
some  grievous  provocation ;  and  the  emotion  is 
different,  because  the  object  is  really  different — an 
offender  who  has  excited  the  anger  of  our  bosom, 
and,  in  the  view  of  whose  inflicted  sufferings,  this 
indignant  feeling  receives  its  gratification.  Or 
the  pain  may  be  inflicted  by  our  own  hand  on  an 
unoffending  animal  in  the  prosecution  of  some 
cruel  experiment.  If  compassion  be  wholly  unfelt, 
it  is  not  because  in  this  instance  the  law  has  been 
repealed  which  connects  this  emotion  with  the 
view  of  pain ;  but  it  is  because  the  attention  of  the 
mind  to  this  object  is  displaced  by  another  object; 
even  the  discovery  of  truth — and  so  what  but  for 
this  might  have  been  an  intense  compassion,  is 
overborne  by  an  intenser  curiosity.  And  so  with 
all  the  other  emotions.  Were  danger  singly  the 
object  of  the  mind’s  contemplation,  fear,  we  think, 
would  be  the  universal  feeling;  but  it  may  be 
danger  connected  with  the  sight  or  the  menaces  of 
an  insulting  enemy  who  awakens  burning  resent¬ 
ment  in  the  heart,  and  when  anger  arises  fear  is 
gone;  or  it  may  be  danger  shared  with  fellow- 
combatants,  whose  presence  and  observation  kindle 
in  the  bosom  the  love  of  glory,  and  impel  to  deeds 
of  heroism — not  because  any  law  which  connects, 
and  connects  invariably,  certain  emotions  with 
certain  objects,  is  m  any  instance  reversed  or 


212 


MORALITY  OP  THE  EMOTIONS. 


suspended ;  but  because,  in  this  conflict  and  com¬ 
position  of  moral  forces,  one  emotion  displaced 
another  from  the  feelings,  only,  however  because 
one  object  displaced  another  from  the  thoughts. 
Still,  in  every  instance,  the  object  is  the  stepping- 
stone  to  the  emotion — insomuch,  tliat  if  we  want 
to  recall  a  certain  emotion,  we  recall  to  the  mind 
that  certain  object  which  awakens  it;  if  we  want 
to  cease  from  the  emotion,  we  must  cease  from 
thinking  of  its  object,  we  must  transfer  the  mind 
to  other  objects,  or  occupy  it  with  other  thoughts. 

37.  It  is  this  connexion  between  the  percipient 
faculties  of  the  mind  and  its  feelings,  which  ex¬ 
plains  the  connexion  between  the  intellectual  and 
the  moral  departments  of  our  nature.  It  is  abun¬ 
dantly  obvious,  that  the  presence  or  the  absence 
of  certain  feelings,  stands  connected  with  the  pre¬ 
sence  or  the  absence  of  certain  thoughts.  We 
can  no  more  break  up  the  connexion  between  the 
thought  of  any  object  that  is  viewed  mentally,  and 
the  feeling  which  it  impresses  on  the  heart,  than 
we  can  break  up  the  connexion  between  the  sight 
of  any  object  that  is  viewed  materially,  and  the  sen¬ 
sation  which  it  impresses  upon  the  retina.  If  we 
look  singly  and  stedfastly  to  an  object  of  a  parti¬ 
cular  colour,  as  red,  there  is  an  organic  necessity 
for  the  peculiar  sensation  of  redness,  from  which 
we  cannot  escape,  but  by  shutting  our  eyes,  or 
turning  them  away  to  objects  that  are  dift'erently 
coloured.  If  we  think  singly  and  stedfastly  on  an 
object  of  a  particular  character,  as  an  injury,  there 
seems  an  organic  necessity  also  for  the  peculiar 
emotion  of  resentment,  from  which  there  appears 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  2H 

to  be  no  other  way  of  escaping,  than  by  stifling 
the  thought,  or  turning  the  mind  away  to  other 
objects  of  contemplation.  Now  we  hear  both  of 
virtuous  emotions  and  of  vicious  emotions ;  and  it 
is  of  capital  importance  to  know  how  to  retain  the 
one  and  to  exclude  the  other — which  is  by  dwell¬ 
ing  in  thought  on  the  objects  that  awaken  the 
former,  and  discharging  from  thought  the  objects 
that  awaken  the  latter.  And  so  it  is  by  thinking 
in  a  certain  way  that  wrong  sensibilities  are 
avoided,  and  right  sensibilities  are  upholden.  It 
is  by  keeping  up  a  remembrance  of  the  kindness, 
that  w'e  keep  up  the  emotion  of  gratitude.  It  is 
by  forgetting  the  provocation,  that  we  cease  from 
the  emotion  of  anger.  It  is  by  reflecting  on  the 
misery  of  a  fellow-creature  in  its  vivid  and  affect¬ 
ing  details,  that  pity  is  called  forth.  It  is  by 
meditating  on  the  perfections  of  the  Godhead  that 
we  cherish  and  keep  alive  our  reverence  for  the 
highest  virtue  and  our  love  for  the  highest  good¬ 
ness.  In  one  word,  thought  is  at  once  the  harbinger 
and  the  sustainer  of  feeling :  and  this,  of  itself, 
forms  an  important  link  of  communication  between 
the  intellectual  and  the  moral  departments  of  our 
nature. 

38.  Actions  ai*e  voluntary  in  themselves,  in  that 
the  mind  can  will  them  directly  into  being.  Emo¬ 
tions  though  not  voluntary  in  themselves,  are  so 
far  voluntary  in  their  proximate  or  immediate 
causes — in  that  the  mind,  to  a  certain  extent,  and 
by  the  control  which  it  has  over  the  faculty  of 
attention,  can  will  those  ideas  into  its  presence  by 
which  the  emotions  are  av/akened.  It  is  well 


214 


MORALITY  or  THE  EMOTIONS. 


that  man  is  thus  vested,  not  only  with  a  control 
over  his  actions ;  but  also  in  a  great  degree  with 
a  control  over  his  emotions,  these  powerful  impel¬ 
lents  to  action — and  it  required  an  exquisite  fitting 
of  the  intellectual  to  the  moral  in  man’s  system, 
ere  such  a  mechanism  could  be  framed.  And  we 
not  only  behold  in  the  relation  between  the  will 
and  the  emotions,  a  skilful  adaptation  in  the  parts 
of  the  human  constitution  to  each  other;  we  also 
behold  a  general  and  manifold  adaptation  to  this 
peculiarity  in  the  various  objects  of  external  nature. 
Man  can,  by  means  of  these  objects,  either  kindle 
the  right  emotions  in  his  bosom,  or  make  his 
escape  from  those  emotions  that  trouble  and  annoy 
him.  By  an  entry  into  an  abode  of  destitution, 
he  can  effectually  soften  his  heart;  by  an  entry 
into  an  abode  of  still  deeper  suffering,  where  are 
to  be  found  the  dead  or  the  dying,  he  can  effec¬ 
tually  solemnize  it.  But  a  still  more  palpable  use 
of  that  indefinite  number  of  objects  wherewith  the 
world  is  so  filled  and  variegated,  is,  that,  by  creat¬ 
ing  an  incessant  diversion  of  the  thoughts  from 
such  objects  as  are  of  malignant  influence,  it  may 
rid  the  inner  man  of  the  grief,  or  the  anger,  or  the 
wayward  licentiousness  of  feeling,  which  might 
otherwise  have  lorded  over  him ;  and  to  the  urgent 
calls  of  business  or  duty  or  amusement,  do  we  owe 
such  lengthened  periods  of  exemption  both  from 
the  emotions  that  pain,  and  from  the  emotions  that 
would  vitiate  and  deprave  us. 

39.  We  dispute  not  the  subjective  difference 
between  one  mind  and  another;  and  that  some¬ 
thing  beside  a  more  or  less  frequent  presence  of 


MORALITY  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


215 


the  objects  is  necessary,  to  account  for  the  more 
or  less  powerful  ascendency  of  the  counterpart 
emotions  over  each  of  them  respectively.  No  one 
can  question  the  inherent  distinction  between  a 
man  of  an  irascible  and  a  man  of  a  pacific  temper ; 
and  that  this  will  evince  itself,  not  only  by  the 
readier  ignition  of  the  former  on  the  contact  of 
real  provocatives  from  without,  but  by  the  influ¬ 
ence  of  this  his  ruling  passion  upon  his  thoughts — 
leading  him,  in  the  absence  of  actual,  to  conceive 
imaginary  wrongs  which  he  might  burn  or  brood 
over.  Thus  might  a  passion  provide  itself,  as  it 
were,  with  its  own  fuel;  and  we  can  even  fancy 
that,  apart  from  the  fuel  altogether,  apart  from 
objects  whether  real  or  only  pictured  by  the  mind, 
the  very  strength  of  its  susceptibilities  might  expose 
it  to  the  feeling  of  some  strange  unappeased  want 
and  wretchedness,  in  the  absence  of  their  counter¬ 
part  objects — from  which  it  can  no  more  escape, 
than  it  can  ward  off*  the  gnawing  agonies  of  hun¬ 
ger,  by  ceasing  to  think  of  bread.  Such  a  state 
is  often  the  elfect  and  the  punishment  of  guilty 
indulgence;  but  this  ought  not  to  obscure  the 
undoubted  and  palpable  truth,  that,  ere  this  con¬ 
dition  of  irreversible  helplessness  has  been  realized, 
the  mind  can  be  weaned  from  the  influence  of  evil 
affections,  by  the  witlidrawment  of  its  thoughts 
from  those  objects  which  both  excite  and  supply 
the  means  of  their  gratification,  and  wooing  the 
attention  to  other  objects  by  which  good  emotions 
are  awakened  to  occupy  the  whole  man,  and  dis¬ 
place  those  hurtful  sensibilities  which  “  war  against 
the  soul.”  It  is  thus  that  attention  becomes  the 


216  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS# 

great  instrument  of  moral  discipline ;  and  it  is 
because  of  the  command  which  the  will  possesses 
over  this  faculty,  that  man  becomes  responsible 
for  the  government  and  regulation  of  his  thoughts. 


CHAPTER  VI 

On  the  undue  Place  which  is  often  given  to  the 
Pmotions^  and  the  delusive  Estimate  of  Human 
Virtue  to  which  it  leads. 

1.  Man,  amid  the  conflict  and  complexity  of  his 
manifold  emotions,  has  also  a  sense  of  right  and 
wrong,  that  is  distinct  from  and  has  the  rightful 
precedency  over  them  all.  This  sense  of  right 
and  wrong  is  often  named  conscience,  and  is  so  de¬ 
nominated,  indeed,  by  Bishop  Butler  in  his  admir¬ 
able  sermons  upon  human  nature.  They  form 
the  three  first  of  his  volume;  and  are  worthy 
of  perusal,  not  merely  as  a  specimen  of  his 
most  sagacious  metaphysics,  but  for  the  great 
practical  importance  of  the  doctrine  which  they 
establish.  The  second  and  third  of  the  series 
have  for  their  common  title  ;  Tiie  Natural  Supre¬ 
macy  of  Conscience  ;  and  wherein  he  demonstrates 
what  that  is  which  peculiarizes  this  part  of  our 
moral  economy  from  all  the  rest.  He  clearly 
evinces,  that  it  does  not  rank  among  the  other 
active  principles  of  our  nature  merely  as  one  of 
equal  or  greater  or  less  force ;  but  that  it  is 
essentially  the  prerogative  and  the  demand  of 


UNDUE  PL.\CF.  GIVEN  TO  T'lE  EVIOTIONS.  217 

conscience  to  have  the  mastery  over  all  the 
passions  and  appetites  and  attections  within  us, 
and  that  a  violence  is  done  to  nature  by  this  mas¬ 
tery  not  being  conceded  to  it.  He  makes  it  obvi¬ 
ous  of  this  faculty,  that  its  essential  function  is  to 
be  a  regulator,  even  as  its  essential  prerogative  is 
that  of  dominion;  and  that  in  like  manner  as 
though  the  actual  rate  of  going  in  a  watch  is  the 
result  of  that  balance  which  obtains  between  the 
various  forces  within  that  are  at  play,  yet  that  if  the 
regulator  have  lost  its  influence  the  watch  may  be 
pronounced  to  be  in  a  state  of  anarchy  and  as 
having  lost  its  natural  and  original  design — so 
althouofh  everv  actual  movement  that  men  do  make 
be  the  necessary  result  of  the  way  in  which  the 
forces  of  his  natural  mechanism  stand  balanced 
the  one  with  the  other,  yet  if  conscience  have  not 
been  that  prevalent  force  by  which  the  balance  has 
been  adjusted,  the  man  is  in  a  state  of  moral 
anarchy,  and  he  hath  fallen  from  the  design  of  his 
original  workmanship.  We  wish  that  Dr.  Brown, 
in  particular,  had  adverted  more  to  this  precious 
composition  of  Butler.  It  is  one  of  the  most  valu¬ 
able  documents  extant  in  the  whole  authorship  of 
moral  science,  and  is  fitted  to  elevate  conscience, 
according  to  the  meaning  that  he  fixes  on  this  term, 
to  elevate  it  to  that  very  place  which  legitimately 
belongs  to  it — to  take  it  away  from  the  list  of  the 
emotions,  where  we  rather  think  it  stands  in  the 
arrangements  of  Dr.  Brown — and  to  invest  it  with 
such  a  superiority  over  them  all,  as  a  master  has 
over  his  servants.  Most  useful  they  are  as  ser¬ 
vants  ;  but  in  no  one  case  does  the  master  lose 

VOJy,  V.  K 


218  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

sight  of  them,  though,  when  he  sees  them  rightly 
and  well  employed,  he  will  in  so  far  leave  them  to 
themselves  as  to  let  them  work  without  any  new 
order  from  him  for  hours  together.  And  so  it  is, 
that  the  principles  of  the  conscience  never  hand  the 
matter  altogether  over  to  the  feelings  of  the  heart. 
Its  office  is  to  maintain  within  us  a  perpetual  will 
to  do  good, — and  to  see  that  this  is  carried  into 
execution.  Often  may  it  happen  that  the  most 
effectual  method  of  so  doing,  is  to  let  the  sensibi¬ 
lities  have  their  course  ;  to  weep  with  those  who 
weep;  and,  during  the  whole  currency  of  some 
visit  of  benevolence,  to  give  the  mind  wholly  over 
to  the  movements  and  the  demonstrations  of  a 
constitutional  tenderness.  Still  conscience  hath 
the  priority,  and,  to  use  a  familiar  but  expressive 
phrase,  hath,  in  every  well-regulated  spirit,  all  its 
eyes  about  it.  And  it  can  shorten  its  visit ;  or  it 
can  recall  its  sensibilities  by  a  transference  of  the 
attention  to  other  objects ;  or  it  can  sit  in  judg¬ 
ment  over  the  question,  whether  after  all,  this  flow 
of  sympathy  might  not  in  the  circumstances  aggra¬ 
vate,  which  it  in  some  cases  does,  the  pain  of  the 
unhappy  sufferer — and,  to  hide  the  irrepressible 
sympathy,  it  can  take  its  sudden  leave — a  flight  of 
very  opposite  character  from  that  of  the  feeling 
sentimentalist,  who  also  flees  from  this  scene  of 
distress,  because  unable  to  support  the  pain  of  his 
too  delicate  sensibilities,  or  perhaps  overcome  by 
the  disgust  and  the  discomfort  of  other  emotions. 
The  following  extracts  are  from  one  of  Dr.  Char¬ 
ters’  sermons  upon  this  subject :  “  Compassion 
improperly  cultivated  springs  up  into  fruitless 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  219 

sensibility.  ‘  If  a  brother  or  sister  be  naked,  and 
destitute  of  daily  food ;  and  one  of  you  say  unto 
them,  Depart  in  peace,  be  you  warmed  and 
clothed,  notwithstanding  ye  give  them  not  those 
things  which  are  needful  for  the  body — what  doth 
it  profit?’  To  enter  the  abodes  of  the  wretched, 
to  give  them  time  and  thought  and  hands  and 
money,  this  is  the  substance  not  the  shadow  of 
virtue.  The  pleasure  of  sensibility  may  be  less ; 
but  so  is  the  danger  of  self-deceit  that  attends  it. 
Deathbeds,  in  the  page  of  an  eloquent  writer, 
delight  the  imagination;  but  they  who  are  most 
delighted  are  not  the  first  to  visit  a  dying  neigh¬ 
bour,  and  sit  up  all  night,  and  wipe  off  the  cold 
sweat,  and  moisten  the  parched  lip,  and  give  easy 
postures,  and  bear  with  peevishness,  and  suggest 
a  pious  thought,  and  console  the  parting  spirit. 
They  often  encompass  the  altar  of  virtue  but  not 
to  sacrifice.” — “  Extreme  sensibility  is  a  diseased 
state  of  the  mind;  it  unfits  us  to  relieve  the 
miserable,  and  tempts  us  to  turn  away.  The 
sight  of  pain  is  shunned ;  and  the  thought  of  it 
suppressed.  The  ear  is  stopped  against  the  cry 
of  indigence.  The  house  of  mourning  is  passed 
by.  Even  near  friends  are  abandoned,  when  sick, 
to  the  nurse  and  physician;  and,  when  dead,  to 
those  who  mourn  for  hire — and  all  this,  under 
pretence  of  fine  feeling  and  sentimental  delicacy. 
The  apples  of  Sodom  are  mistaken  for  the  fruit  of 
paradise.”  “  Compassion  may  fall  on  wrong  objects, 
and  yet  be  gratified  and  applauded.  One  living  in 
borrowed  affluence  becomes  bankrupt.  His  sud¬ 
den  fall  strikes  the  imagination — ^pity  is  felt  and 


220  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

generous  exertions  are  made  in  his  behalf.  There 
is  indeed  a  call  for  pity  but  upon  \\  horn  ?  Upon 
servants  who  have  received  no  wages ;  upon 
traders  and  artificers  whose  economy  he  has  de¬ 
ranged  ;  upon  the  widow  whom  he  has  caused  to 
weep  over  destitute  children.  Alms  given  from 
the  impulse  of  compassion  are  like  seed  sown  on 
stony  ground,  which  quickly  springs  up  and  as 
quickly  withers.  By  repeated  acts  the  force  of 
passive  habits  is  diminished.  Imposture  pro¬ 
vokes,  ingratitude  grieves,  and  time  cools  the 
heart.” 

2.  There  is  a  delusion  with  which  the  literature 
of  half  a  century  back  was  greatly  overrun,  and  a 
delusion  that  still  obtains  in  private  life  though 
chiefly  we  believe  among  the  upper  classes  of 
society — and  by  which  the  honours  and  the  rewards 
of  virtue  have  been  transferred  from  him  who  is 
characterized  by  sturdy  and  enduring  principle, 
to  him  who  characterized  only  by  his  soft  and  de¬ 
licate  pathology  gives  way  on  all  occasions-  to  the 
tenderness  of  his  emotions.  The  one  s})ends  his 
doings  in  the  work  and  the  labour  of  virtue.  Tiie 
other  in  the  pleasing  indulgence  of  those  sensibi¬ 
lities  which  have  usurped  the  denomination  of 
virtue,  and  so  foster  a  most  pernicious  complacency 
within  his  bosom.  If  a  man  of  constitutional 
tenderness,  which  without  any  conscience  at  ail  he 
may  very  well  be,  he  may  at  times  taste  the  luxury 
of  doing  good ;  but  never  will  he  submit  to  the 
labour  of  it.  With  him  it  is  all  a  matter  of  enjoy¬ 
ment,  but  never  of  self-denial ;  and  the  very  same 
facility  of  temperament  which  lays  him  open  to 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  22l 

tne  visitations  of  sympathy,  may  also  lay  him  open 
to  the  grosser  affections  of  our  nature.  It  is  thus 
that,  along  with  the  delights  of  sentiment,  there 
might  mingle  all  the  degradations  of  a  most  worth¬ 
less  and  polluting  sensuality ;  and,  amid  many 
occasional  gleams  of  humane  and  honourable  feel¬ 
ing,  might  the  whole  moral  system  be  a  prostrate 
wreck  under  the  sensibilities  of  all  soits  and  de¬ 
scriptions  which  lord  it  over  us.  Some  of  these, 
though  not  virtues,  are  the  ministers  of  virtue; 
and,  wearing  the  livery  of  their  master,  they  have 
arrogated,  as  the  insolent  menials  of  a  lordly  pro¬ 
prietor  often  do,  the  honour  that  belongs  to  it. 
It  is  thus  that  many,  utterly  adrift  from  the  re-  , 
straints  of  conscience,  pass  a  life  in  the  orld, 
that  might  be  characterized  as  a  compound  of 
loathsome  vices  and  amiable  feelings  ;  and  when 
these  vices  obtain  the  gentle  epithet  of  foibles,  and 
these  feelings  are  signalized  by  the  appellation  of 
so  many  virtues — we  may  conceive  the  dreadful 
injury  which  the  character,  under  this  melancholy 
process  of  self-delusion,  must  sustain.  Those 
susceptibilities  of  emotion,  which  after  all  have  m 
themselves  nought  of  a  moral  character,  will  be 
rated  as  so  many  moralities,  and  set  over  against 
those  sensualities  which  are  most  undoubted  vio¬ 
lations  of  morality.  It  is  thus  that  vice  has  been 
exhibited  in  the  world  in  most  attractive  colours, 
and  just  by  the  aid  of  those  engaging  and  most 
useful  sensibihties  wherewith  she  often  is  associ¬ 
ated.  And  as  in  the  same  production  of  high  but 
worthless  genius,  the  licentiousness  of  one  of  its 
passages  is  often  thought  to  be  redeemed  by  the 


222  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

powerful  and  pathetic  eloquence  of  another — so  in 
the  life  of  the  same  individual,  though  not  so  high 
in  talent  yet  alike  worthless  in  principle,  might 
there  occur  at  one  time  passages  marked  by  some 
effusion  of  tenderness,  or  even  under  the  impulse 
of  it  by  some  deed  of  generosity,  while  these  are 
constantly  alternated  by  the  abominations  of  licen¬ 
tiousness. 

3.  In  this  way  the  utmost  mischief  has  been 
done  by  those,  who  idolize  the  sensibilities  of  the 
heart,  as  if  they  were  the  ultimate  principles  of 
virtue — who  recognise  not  that  presiding  authority, 
wherewith  conscience  sits  supreme  among  all  the 
emotions  to  which  our  nature  is  liable — and  who, 
in  consequence,  leave  the  inner  man  to  the  wild 
misrule  of  all  such  affections  and  feelings  as  might 
happen  for  the  time  to  have  the  ascendancy.  In 
this  condition,  the  mind  is  like  unto  a  vessel  with¬ 
out  pilotage,  and  at  the  mercy  of  all  the  fitful  ele¬ 
ments  to  which  it  is  exposed — moving  at  times 
no  doubt  towards  that  quarter  which  is  most  de¬ 
sirable,  yet  without  the  most  distant  chance, 
amongst  such  random  influences  as  the  gales  of 
heaven,  and  the  surges  of  a  restless  ocean,  of  ever 
reaching  that  haven  for  which  it  had  been  destined 
by  its  owners.  And  thus  fares,  it  with  man  in 
reference  to  the  great  voyage  of  life,  after  that 
conscience  hath  quitted  its  mastery  over  him,  and 
he  now  lies  open  to  the  thousand  fortuitous  im¬ 
pulses  that  play  from  without  on  the  mechanism 
of  his  sentient  and  susceptible  nature.  There  will, 
at  times,  be  the  very  movement  that  duty  would 
have  prompted — and,  even  from  his  unregulated 


UNDUE  PI, ACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  223 

spirit,  there  vvill  be  the  occasional  gleams  both  ot 
the  humane  and  of  the  honourable.  But  wanting 
that  still  small  voice,  at  whose  utterance  alone 
all  the  tumults  of  the  soul  are  harmonized,  there 
will  be  the  shifts  and  the  uncertainties  of  a  perpe¬ 
tual  waywardness.  Adrift  from  all  regulation,  the 
man  will  be  floated  along  on  the  tide  of  circum¬ 
stances  ;  and,  subject  to  influences  from  the  world 
around  him,  in  as  many  directions  as  he  has  the 
capacities  of  emotion,  his  life,  without  one  sure 
advancement  in  the  path  of  moral  rectitude,  will 
be  spent  in  a  sort  of  indescribable  medley  from  his 
infancy  to  his  grave. 

4.  In  these  circumstances  it  is  not  to  be  told  how 
pernicious  that  delusion  is  which  has  been  so  fed 
and  fostered  in  our  works  of  sentimentalism,  and 
over  which  the  most  bewitching  eloquence  hath 
spread  its  fascinations.  The  two  writers  whom  at 
present  we  have  most  in  our  eye,  are  Sterne  and 
Rousseau — who  though,  of  very  different  com¬ 
plexion,  at  least  agreed  in  this,  that  they  were  the 
worshippers  of  nature  in  all  her  instinctive  sensi¬ 
bilities  ;  who  could  both  of  them  seize  upon  her  in 
her  loveliest  attitudes,  and  hold  her  forth  in  most 
graceful  exhibition  to  an  admiring  world.  They 
are  certainly  far  more  formidable  than  any  of  those 
more  shallow  sentimentalists,  who  expatiate  on 
virtue  too  not  as  a  thing  of  principle  but  as  a  thing 
of  prettiness ;  who  tan  give  delight  to  readers  in 
every  way  as  slender  as  themselves  by  versifica¬ 
tions  upon  a  tear ;  and  who,  out  of  such  materials 
a»  sighs  and  sympathies  and  the  various  suiter 
delicacies  of  the  heart,  can  braid  them  all  together 


224  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

into  garlands  of  sweetest  poesy.  To  an  unvitiated 
English  taste  all  whose  preferences  are  for  the 
home-bred,  there  is  something  in  this  sentimental 
frippery  that  is  wholly  unsutFerable — and  one  just 
meets  with  the  refreshment  that  he  feels  himself 
most  in  need  of,  when  he  turns  him  to  the  descrip¬ 
tion  given  by  Cowper  of  one  of  wholesomer  breed 
— strong  built  in  the  cardinal  virtues,  and  whose 
very  exterior  like  that  of  a  Yorkshire  grazier 
bespoke  the  haleness  and  honesty  of  his  inner 
temperament. 

“  While  you  my  friend  whatever  wind  should  blow. 

Might  traverse  England  safely  to  and  fro, 

An  honest  man  close  buttoned  to  the  chin, 

Broad  cloth  without  and  a  warm  heart  within,” 

5.  The  effeminacies  which  we  are  now  attempt¬ 
ing  to  expose  are  certainly  getting  out  of  credit — 
and,  instead  of  languishing  with  the  dilettanti  of  a 
former  generation  over  the  high-wrought  and 
pathetic  narratives  of  fiction,  there  is  now  a  very 
general  disposition  to  laugh  at  them.  And  even 
among  our  poets  and  novelists  themselves,  there 
is  a  firmer  staple  than  there  wont  of  the  plainly  and 
honestly  experimental — and  we  can  instance  more 
particularly  the  compositions  of  Miss  Edgeworth, 
as  the  native  produce  of  a  mind,  that,  with  much 
sagacity  and  good  sense,  hath  observantly  looked 
on  the  features  and  more  especially  on  the  foibles 
of  our  living  society.  Still,  however,  there  remains 
enough  and  more  than  enough  in  our  most  recent 
books  of  entertainment,  to  exemplify  the  wide  dis¬ 
tinction  which  there  is  between  the  ideal  represen¬ 
tations  that  bring  the  mind  into  a  state  of  exquisite 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  225 

emotion,  and  those  earthly  and  actual  scenes  in 
which  we  daily  move,  and  which  are  brought  around 
us  to  discipline  the  mind  into  a  state  of  exercised 
principle.  In  those  touching  sketches  that  we 
have  byM‘Kenzie,  the  Man  of  Feeling — the  princi¬ 
pal  figure  of  the  groupe,  the  sufferer  in  whom  he 
labours  to  interest  every  affection  of  our  hearts, 
becomes  the  intense  and  the  absorbing  object  of 
contemplation,  and  every  accompaniment  that  can 
distract  our  regards  from  him,  or  at  least  that  can 
turn  away  our  eyes  in  disgust  from  that  scene  by 
which  he  hopes  to  call  forth  the  emotion  of  his 
readers,  is  most  carefully  suppressed ;  and  by  the 
help  of  honeysuckle  at  the  cottage  door,  and  a 
welcome  of  gratitude  on  the  part  of  all  its  inmates, 
and  a  tasteful  exhibition  of  that  clean  and  orderly 
apartment  where  the  venerable  father  of  some  poor 
and  pious  family  is  dying,  there  may  be  heightened 
to  the  uttermost  those  sensibilities  which  it  is  the 
proudest  triumph  of  his  art  to  awaken ;  and  the 
flattering  unction  which  comes  upon  the  soul  of  a 
weeping  sentimentalist,  is,  that  with  all  the  infirmi¬ 
ties  of  his  erring  nature,  there  is  surely  nought 
in  a  heart  of  so  much  tenderness  that  is  radically 
wrong.  But  the  susceptibility  of  an  exquisite 
emotion  is  one  thing — the  sturdiness  of  an  enduring 
principle  is  another.  To  estimate  the  w'orth  of  a 
heart,  we  should  do  it,  not  by  the  power  of  its 
feelings  and  constitutional  instincts,  but  by  the 
power  of  that  conscience  which  hath  right  of  ascen¬ 
dancy  over  them  all.  We  should  confront  the 
owner  of  it  with  the  realities  and  the  repulsions, 
that  try  the  strength  of  human  virtue  in  our 

K  2 


226  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

ordinary  world.  It  h  cr.fiy  to  be  floated  along  on 
the  current  of  our  emotions ;  but,  in  the  warfare 
of  moral  discipline,  we  are  often  called  upon  to 
struggle  against  the  current,  and  the  decisive 
touchstone  of  character  is,  whether  we  have  the 
nerve  and  the  hardihood  of  principle  for  doing  so 
— not  whether  we  can  weep  over  those  choice 
fancies,  where  the  artist  hath  made  all  to  harmonize 
with  the  emotions  of  benevolence ;  but  whether,  in 
weariness  and  in  watchfulness  and  amongst  the 
occupations  of  an  actual  and  a  living  scene,  whether 
when  this  one  emotion  is  thwarted  by  the  annoy¬ 
ance  of  many  others,  conscience  can  uphold  its 
supremacy,  and  still  charge  it  upon  the  will  that  it 
shall  keep  by  its  purposes  of  well-doing — whether 
when,  after  passing  fi'om  the  tasteful  representa¬ 
tion  to  the  sober  and  perhaps  ungainly  realities  of 
virtue,  and  so  the  scene  for  exhibition  hath  lost  aU 
its  beauty,  we  can  nevertheless  give  our  hand  to 
its  business ;  and,  in  the  midst  of  much  to  nauseate 
and  much  to  discourage  us,  it  still  abideth  our  ^ 
uppermost  concern  to  do  what  we  ought  and  to 
be  what  we  ought. 

6.  And  here  we  cannot  fail  to  perceive  that  by 
the  force  of  attention,  a  force  imparted  to  it  from 
the  mere  strength  and  urgency  of  principle,  there 
is  at  length  wrought  out,  and  strenuously  kept  in 
operation  over  the  mind,  the  very  pathology,  which 
the  artist,  anxious  to  awaken  and  perpetuate 
some  certain  emotions,  brings  to  bear  on  the  hearts 
of  those  to  whom  he  arddresses  himself.  Let  the 
painter,  for  example,  attempt  some  pathetic  repre¬ 
sentation  ;  and  he  will  beware  of  introducing  into 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  227 

his  performance  aught  that  can  at  all  disturb  or 
diminish  the  sympathy  of  the  observer.  We  are 
supposing  that  his  object  is  not  fidelity,  but  effect 
—the  effect  of  as  vivid  and  powerful  a  sympathy 
as  he  can  possibly  impress  on  the  feelings  of  the 
spectator.  He  will  suffer  his  pencil  then  to  give 
forth  all  the  indications  of  deepest  poverty,  but 
not  the  filth  and  nauseousness  wherewith  it  is  so 
often  associated;  and  also  to  give  forth  the  piteous 
and  imploring  aspect  of  distress  in  the  sufferer* 
but  not  the  expression  of  depravity  and  low  dissi¬ 
pation  wherewith  it  is  so  often  mingled;  and 
further  to  give  forth  the  affection  and  the  tender 
assiduity  of  his  weeping  relatives,  but  not  the 
remorseless  hardihood  of  soul  that  often  in  circum¬ 
stances  even  of  extreme  suffering  has  been  known 
to  sit  on  the  countenance  of  an  outlandish  family ; 
and  furthermore  to  render  with  full  efficacy  that 
smile  of  mercy  by  which  some  affluent  son  or 
daughter  of  sensibility  hath  lighted  up  the  scene, 
and  that  response  of  grateful  emotion  on  the  part 
of  the  household  inmates,  which  gladdens  and 
gleams  upon  them  back  again — but  never  would  he 
once  think  of  spoiling  the  whole  representation, 
by  depicting  one  feature  or  one  token  of  that  un¬ 
graciousness,  wherewith  the  benevolence  of  actual 
life  is  so  often  exercised.  And  there  is  no  doubt, 
that,  by  the  help  of  all  this  singling  out  in  the 
case  of  the  provocatives  to  sympathy,  and  all  this 
sinking  and  suppressing  in  the  case  of  what  might 
damp  or  extinguish  it,  he  may  succeed  in  offering 
such  an  exhibition,  as  could  move  to  tragic  sensi¬ 
bility  the  amateurs  of  emotion.  ISow  it  is  instruo 


228  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS, 

tive  to  observe,  how  it  is  that  attention  forces  a 
way  for  us  to  the  very  same  pathology — that  it 
does,  in  the  one  case,  what  the  skill  of  the  artist 
hath  accomplished  in  the  other — that,  fastening 
itself  upon  the  one  object  of  distress,  it  brings  it 
out  in  more  impressive  colouring — that,  in  the 
intensity  of  its  look  towards  this,  it  overlooks  the 
very  circumstances  that  are  omitted  hy  the  painter 
— and  that  thus,  in  virtue  of  principle,  the  man 
who  goeth  forth  on  the  actual  territory  of  human 
wretchedness,  works  and  makes  good  his  progress 
towards  the  very  emotions,  which,  in  virtue  of  a 
high  effort  of  professional  skill,  has  been  brought  to 
act  on  the  passive  and  the  indolent  sentimentalist. 
We  can  be  at  no  loss  to  decide,  on  which  of  the 
two  the  homage  due  to  virtue  should  be  awarded. 
The  one  has  struggled  his  own  way  to  that  patho¬ 
logy  which  has  been  brought  to  the  other’s  door. 
The  one  had  to  fight  against  many  adverse  ele¬ 
ments  ere  he  could  realize  it ;  while  from  the  eye 
and  the  imagination  of  the  other,  these  elements 
have  been  kept  most  carefully  away.  In  virtue 
of  attention  doing  in  the  one  case,  what  the  pencil 
had  achieved  in  the  other — each  may  have  at  length, 
but  by  very  different  processes,  had  their  feelings 
engaged  in  substantially  the  same  object;  but 
while  the  one  only  wept  over  it  in  his  easy  chair — 
both  the  heart  and  the  hand  of  the  other  were  at 
the  very  spot,  where  the  sacrifices  of  benevolence 
had  to  be  made,  where  the  services  of  benevolence 
had  to  be  rendei*ed. 

7.  And  we  cannot  leave  the  subject,  without 
expressing  it  as  our  strong  suspicion,  whether 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  229 


«ven  our  better  works  of  fiction,  while  they  have 
contributed  so  much  to  the  delight,  have  contri¬ 
buted  ought  to  the  improvement  of  our  species. 
The  very  best  of  them  transport  the  imagination 
of  their  readers  to  some  fairy  land — a  transcen¬ 
dental  region  that  lies  far  aloft  fiom  the  affaus 
and  the  doings  of  ordinary  life  ;  and  they  who 
frequently  indulge  in  the  perusal  of  them,  must  be 
quite  aware  of  the  difference  that  there  is  between 
the  sober  hues  of  reality,  and  that  preternatural 
colouring  which  tinges  almost  the  whole  romance 
and  poetry  of  our  modern  literature.  Our  de¬ 
sire  is  for  that  which  admits  of  familiar  appli¬ 
cation  to  the  houses  and  the  bosoms  and  the 
business  of  men — and  our  dread  of  the  works  in 
question  is,  not  only  that  in  virtue  of  this  remote¬ 
ness  from  the  every-day  concerns  of  humanity 
they  are  altogether  useless — but,  still  more  alarm¬ 
ing,  that,  in  virtue  of  their  chief  appliance  being 
to  the  pathology  of  our  nature  and  not  to  its  prin¬ 
ciples,  the  vigilance  of  the  latter  is  lulled  wholly 
asleep  while  the  former  is  kept  iu  a  state  of  indo¬ 
lent  gratification.  It  is  just  because  this  pathology 
includes  the  emotions  which  are  said  to  involve  a 
moral  feeling  in  them,  that  we  hold  every  work 
addrest  exclusively  to  this  department  of  our 
nature  to  be  so  very  dangerous — for,  along  with 
these  emotions,  it  also  includes  all  those  baser 
propensities  by  the  lawless  indulgence  of  which 
a  sore  leprosy  is  inflicted  on  the  whole  moral 
temperament  of  man;  and  he  who  else  might  have 
stood  proudly  out  among  his  fellow's,  with  all  his 
pure  and  honourable  delicacies  untainted,  becomes 


230  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

the  degraded  bondsman  of  those  vile  and  worthless 
affections  which  he  has  fostered  by  indulgence  into  a 
habit  of  domineering  tyranny  over  him.  It  is  be¬ 
cause  pathology  hath  its  elegancies,  and  its  sympa¬ 
thies,  and  its  powerful  attractions  for  the  imagina¬ 
tion  and  the  heart,  along  w'ith  its  vicious  excitements, 
that  it  is  so  insinuating — and,  only  conceive  it  to 
have  full  sway,  which  it  is  most  likely  to  have  over 
the  disciples  of  that  literature,  where  the  supremacy 
of  conscience  is  never  once  recognised  and  no  place 
is  given  to  her  grave  admonitions — and  then,  ac¬ 
complished  in  such  schools  as  those  of  Sterne  and 
Rousseau,  we  may  have  a  whole  generation  of 
pretenders  to  virtue  who  to  the  pathos  of  most 
susceptible  feelings  add  the  pruriency  of  no  less 
susceptible  appetites ;  who  can  one  hour  weep  in 
all  the  gracefulness  of  theatrical  emotion,  and  at 
another  wanton  among  the  excesses  of  forbidden 
enjoyment;  who  can  live  in  shameless  defiance  to  the 
restraints  of  principle,  and  yet  live  in  the  deceitful 
complacency  that  they  are  w  orshippers  at  her  shrine. 

8.  So  long  as  the  slightest  shade  of  uncertainty 
rests  upon  a  question,  w'e  are  not  fond  of  dogma¬ 
tising  ;  but  there  is,  at  least,  one  deliverance  upon 
works  of  fiction  in  the  safety  and  the  soundness  of 
which  we  feel  altogether  confident.  Did  we  hear  of 
any  one  acquaintance  who  had  now  bidden  his  con¬ 
clusive  adieu  to  them  all,  we  would  not  have  the 
slightest  apprehension,  lest  either  the  moral  or  the 
intellectual  of  his  natui*e  should  at  all  suffer  by  it. 
Did  we  hear  of  him  on  the  other  hand  much  and 
greedily  addicted  to  the  perusal  of  tl  vm,  we  should 
tremble  for  the  deterioration  of  both. 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  231 

9.  But  there  is  another  result  still  more  im¬ 
portant.  We  are  quite  prepared  to  admit,  that  the 
affection  of  a  mother  for  its  young  among  the  in¬ 
ferior  animals,  hath  nought  in  it  whatever  of  any 
moral  characteristic;  and  may  hence  see  how 
possible  it  is  that  the  same  thing  may  obtain  of  the 
similar  affection  in  our  own  species.  It  is  not 
conscience  which  prompts  the  attentions  of  a 
mother  to  her  babe — and,  apart  from  this  faculty 
or  its  suggestions  altogether,  the  affection  that  we 
now  speak  of  may  be  felt  in  all  its  tenderness,  and 
stand  forth  too  in  most  graceful  exhibition  to  the 
eye  of  him  who  is  a  tasteful  admirer  of  human 
virtue.  That  instinct  which  leads  to  the  forma¬ 
tion  of  a  nest,  or  of  a  honey-comb,  may  indicate 
no  sagacity  whatever  in  the  creature  that  possesses 

it _ though  the  utmost  sagacity  in  the  Creator  who 

implanted  it — and,  in  like  manner,  the  instinct 
which  so  links  a  mother  to  her  offspring,  whether 
among  the  inferior  species  or  our  own,  may  indi¬ 
cate  no  moral  goodness  on  the  part  of  her  who  is 
actuated  thereby — though  it  most  strikingly  de¬ 
monstrate  the  care  and  goodness  of  Him,  who  hath 
established  this  most  powerful  affinity  in  a  mother’s 
heart.  Now  the  same  holds  true  of  other  instinc¬ 
tive  affinities  of  our  nature.  It  holds  true  of  com¬ 
passion.  A  sense  of  duty  may  guide  us  to  the 
object  by  which  this  sensibility  is  awakened — and 
it  may  also  fasten  and  perpetuate  upon  the  object 
that  attention  by  which  the  sensibility  is  upholden. 
But  manifold  are  the  occasions,  on  which,  by  the 
mere  casualties  of  human  intercourse,  the  excite¬ 
ments  to  this  feeling  come  in  our  way ;  a  fellow- 


232  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

creature  in  distress,  whether  we  will  or  not,  is 
obtruded  upon  our  notice ;  and  the  general  sym¬ 
pathy  that  we  have  for  those  of  our  own  kind, 
comes  forth  as  urgently  as  irresistibly  and  as  inde¬ 
pendently  of  all  aid  from  principle,  as  doth  the 
parental  sympathy  for  those  of  our  own  family. 
The  sight  of  a  human  being  in  the  agonies  of 
hunger,  would  draw  it  most  powerfully  out  in  any 
quarter  of  the  world.  It  does  so  every  day  in  the 
streets  of  London — and  we  have  no  doubt  that  it 
does  so  too  in  the  lanes  of  Constantinople.  It  exists 
and  hath  constant  operation,  under  all  the  diversities 
whether  of  national  character  or  of  religious  faith — 
insomuch  that  pity  for  hunger  in  another,  though  not 
so  strong,  is  nearly  as  universal  as  the  appetite  of 
hunger  in  oneself.  Now,  however  startling  the  af¬ 
firmation  should  be,  it  is  nevertheless  most  strictly 
and  metaphysically  true,  that  there  may  be  just 
as  little  of  virtue  in  the  emotion  as  in  the  appetite. 
*Were  it  not  for  the  perpetual  recurrence  of  hunger, 
the  human  frame  would  speedily  go  into  dissolution, 
even  in  the  midst  of  the  most  abundant  materials 
for  upholding  it — and,  were  it  not  for  the  action 
and  reaction  of  sympathy,  this  abundance  would 
not  be  enough  diffused  throughout  the  mass ;  and 
so  a  woeful  havock  be  inflicted  upon  human 
society.  And  so  instincts — most  beneficial  in¬ 
stincts  are  given — whose  headlong  urgency  we 
obey,  at  the  very  time  that  conscience  is  fast 
asleep,  and  in  a  state  of  profoundest  oblivion. 
And  it  is  even  so  with  many  other  of  our  emotions 
— with  our  sense  of  shame,  that  restrains  us  from 
the  perpetration  of  many  outrages — with  our  love 


UNDUE  PLA.CE  GUEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  233 

Or  glory,  that  leads  to  many  a  deed  of  patriotism 
— with  our  resentments,  that  act  as  a  barrier  of 
defence  against  the  excesses  of  human  violence — 

O 

with  our  fears,  that  make  us  shrink  from  the  indig¬ 
nation  of  our  fellow-men.  It  is  by  an  adjustment 
and  a  balance  among  the  various  principles  of  their 
economy,  that  the  other  species  of  animals  are 
upheld;  and  were  any  one  of  these  principles 
struck  out  from  among  the  laws  of  their  constitu¬ 
tion,  as  the  maternal  sympathy  for  example,  the 
species  would  rapidly  disappear.  And  there  is 
precisely  a  similar  adjustment  among  ourselves — 
the  play  of  many  emotions  whose  complex  result 
is  the  continued  preservation  of  the  human  family ; 
and  which  result  might  be  arrived  at,  without  one 
particle  of  virtue  in  the  world.  It  is  not  that 
virtue  does  not  scatter  a  thousand  blessings  in  its 
train,  and  so  as  to  form  any  society  of  men  among 
whom  it  enters  into  a  far  more  secure  and  happier 
commonwealth.  But  it  is  that  the  wisdom  of  God 
hath  not  left  the^  existence  of  our  species,  essen¬ 
tially  to  depend  on  an  element  so  frail  and  so 
fluctuating  as  their  virtue — it  is  that,  even  in  the 
utter  absence  of  this  ingredient  from  human  affairs, 
the  mechanism  of  society  can  be  upheld  and  kept 
agoing,  on  the  instincts  which  He  hath  Himself 
implanted  in  the  human  constitution.  Hence  it 
is  that,  in  the  very  companionships  of  iniquity, 
natural  affection  and  kindred  sympathies  and  many 
of  the  virtues  of  trusty  and  sworn  brotherhood  are 
to  be  found;  and  so  likewise,  over  the  face  of 
society  at  large,  might  there  be  witnessed  the 
comely  exhibition  of  many  kind  offices  and  manv 


234  Ul  3UE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS,  j 

respectable  decencies,  and  all  consisting  with 
utter  dormancy  of  what  strictly  and  essentially  la 
moral  principle, 

10.  And  ti)is,  after  all,  might  serve  to  convince 
us,  how  little  it  is  that  a  sense  of  duty  may  enter 
as  an  element  of  influence  or  operation  into  the 
system  of  human  life.  There  are  shame,  and  pity, 
and  anger,  and  other  constitutional  tendencies  of 
our  nature,  that  act  as  so  many  wholesome  im¬ 
pulses  ;  and  are  of  indispensable  service  to  our 
species,  without  any  care  whatever  on  our  part 
about  doing  as  we  ought  or  being  as  we  ought. 
Each  may  walk  in  his  own  way  just  as  he  is 
driven — and,  in  tpe  multiplicity  of  those  influences 
'svhich  tell  upon  his  heart  and  give  movement  to 
his  history,  it  is  altogether  possible  that  the  sense 
of  right  and  of  wrong  may  have  no  place.  There 
is  an  instinctive  delicacy,  and  an  instinctive  ten¬ 
derness,  and  an  instinctive  resentment  which,  by 
the  force  of  a  sympathy  as  constitutional  as  itself, 
might,  without  borrowing  any  aid  from  principle  at 
all,  rise  even  into  the  character  of  a  generous  or 
patriotic  indignation ;  and  thus  show  how,  in  per¬ 
fect  agreement  with  the  many  noble  or  engaging 
attitudes  which  humanity  can  put  on,  in  respect  of 
that  which  is  really  or  radically  virtue,  humanity 
may  be  altogether  destitute.  We  know  how  taste 
and  philosophy  have  been  revolted  by  a  doctrine 
that  sounds  so  harshly  in  their  ears,  as  that  of 
man's  deep  and  general  depravity.  It  is  a  doc¬ 
trine,  however,  borne  out  by  the  phenomena  of 
his  moral  nature ;  and  the  very  same  blow  which 
strikes  at  the  root  of  meagre  sentimentalism,  also 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  235 

lays  open  the  meagreness  of  an  unsound  or  super¬ 
ficial  theology. 

11.  The  physiology  of  plants  and  of  animals 
gives  rise  to  many  beauteous  exhibitions — yet  in 
neither  should  we  ever  look  for  that  which  is  the 
constituting  essence  of  virtue.  Nevertheless  in 
the  absence  of  virtue,  there  may  be  the  presence 
of  a  most  engaging  loveliness.  And  so  the  mere 
pathology  of  mind  may  give  rise  to  many  beau¬ 
teous  exhibitions — yet  unless  when  conscience 
intermeddles,  there  is  not  one  particle  of  virtue  in 
any  of  her  emotions  or  her  processes.  Neverthe¬ 
less  here  also,  in  the  absence  of  virtue,  there  may 
be  the  presence  of  that  which  poetry  rejoices  to 
seize  upon.  “Look  thou  abroad,  says  AkensidCj 

“  Look  thou  abroad  through  nature  to  the  range 
Of  planets,  suns,  and  adamantine  spheres, 

Wheeling  unbroken  through  the  void  immense; 

And  speak,  O  man,  does  this  capacious  scene. 

With  half  that  kindling  majesty  dilate 
Xhy  strong  conception,  as  when  Brutus  rose 
Refulgent  from  the  stroke  of  Csesar  s  fate, 

Amid  the  crowd  of  patriots ;  and  his  arm 
Aloft  extending  like  eternal  Jove 
When  guilt  brings  down  the  thunder,  called  aloud 
On  Tully’s  name,  and  shook  his  crimson  steel, 

And  bade  the  father  of  his  country  hail  1 
For  lo  the  tyrant  prostrate  in  the  dust. 

And  Rome  again  is  free?  Is  aught  so  fair 
In  all  the  dewy  landscapes  of  the  spring. 

In  the  bright  eye  of  Hesper  or  the  morn. 

In  nature’s  fairest  form  is  aught  so  fair. 

As  virtuous  friendship  ?  As  the  candid  blush 
Of  him  who  strives  with  fortune  to  be  just  ? 

The  graceful  tear  that  streams  for  others’  woes ! 

Or  the  mild  majesty  of  private  life, 

When  peace  with  ever  blooming  olive  crowns 
The  gate  ;  when  honour’s  liberal  hands  effuse 
Unenvied  treasures ;  and  the  snowy  wings 
Of  innocence  and  love  protect  the  scene  ?’ 


336  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

12.  There  can  be  no  doubt,  that,  if  conscience 
had  at  all  times  the  place  which  Bishop  Butler  in 
his  admirable  disquisition  hath  assigned  to  it  as  its 
rightful  station  of  ascendancy — that,  if  it  acted  as 
a  regulator  among  the  emotions,  and  so  either 
fostered  or  repressed  them  according  to  the  etfect 
of  their  indulgence  upon  the  moral  and  physical 
good  of  the  human  family — these  fascinating  pic¬ 
tures  would  no  longer  float  so  exclusively  as  they 
have  heretofore  done  in  the  dreams,  in  the  phan¬ 
tasies,  in  the  airy  imaginations  of  poetry.  They 
would  come  down  from  this  mystic  and  ethereal 
region,  and  dwell  imbodied  upon  Earth  as  so 
many  substantial  realities — and  we  despair  not  of 
those  millennial  days,  .when  the  world  shall  be 
filled  with  them.  This  however  will  be  the 
triumph,  not  of  sensibility,  but  of  virtue ;  and  of  a 
virtue,  at  the  same  time,  which  will  not  extinguish 
the  sensibilities,  but  will  guide  them — in  whose 
hand  they  will  be  the  instruments  of  well-doing — 
and,  under  whose  presiding  authority,  they  will 
accomplish  the  purposes,  for  which  they  have  been 
given.  Then  virtuous  friendship  will  carry  no 
delusion  along  with  it — for  now  the  emotions 
which  enter  into  friendship,  may  centre  upon  a 
favourite  and  a  selected  object,  and  yet  not  be  vir¬ 
tuous,  any  more  in  fact  than  the  attachments 
w'hich  obtain  among  inferior  animals — yet  these 
attachments  may  both  be  so  beautifully  pleasing 
in  themselves,  as  to  render  them  fair  subjects  for 
poetry,  and  at  the  same  time  so  useful  in  the 
tqiecies  where  they  are  exemplified  as  to  render 
them  the  fair  subjects  of  benevolent  gratulation 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  237 

It  is  thus  too  that  in  our  own  species,  there  may 
be  afforded  many  graceful  exhibitions  of  conduct, 
to  which  we  have  been  led,  just  as  the  lower  animals 
are,  by  the  spontaneous  and  wholly  unregulated 
sympathies  of  our  nature.  There  must  be  a 
misconception  somewhere — there  must  be  a  carry¬ 
ing  of  the  tastefulness  over  the  truth — when  the 
incense  that  should  be  offered  to  morality  alone,  is 
made  to  arise  in  poetic  or  sentimental  homage  to  such 
exhibitions  of  our  nature,  as  creatures  incapable 
of  morality  are  still  as  capable  of  as  we.  And 
it  is  thus  that  Dr,  Brown,  who  stands  unrivalled 
in  the  metaphysical  department  of  his  course, 
often  fails  in  the  ethical — which,  with  the  ex¬ 
ception  of  some  very  admirable  introductory 
chapters,  is  on  the  whole  we  think  unsatisfactory 
and  meagre.  When  he  speaks  of  all  the  mothers 
who  at  this  moment  on  the  earth  are  exercised, 
and  virtuously  exercised,  in  maternal  duties  around 
the  cradles  of  their  infants — we  are  quite  aware 
that  these  are  duties  wherewith  principle  has  to 
do — for  it  were  indeed  a  monstrous  violation  of 
principle  to  neglect  them.  But  surely  what  of 
instinct  there  is  in  this  process  must  be  separable 
from  what  of  principle  there  is  in  it — else  there 
is  not  a  mother  that  lives  from  the  fiercest  of 
those  creatures  which  prey  and  prowl  in  the  wil¬ 
derness,  down  to  the  loathsomest  which  breed  in 
the  midst  of  putrefaction,  that  does  not  admit  of 
being  morally  eulogised — and  that  must  unques¬ 
tionably  be  a  delusion,  which  would  so  mix  and  so 
misnomer  the^  things  that  be  wholly  distinct  tne 
one  from  the  other,  as  to  affix  the  epithet  of  a 


238  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

Virtue  to  a  universal  instinct  of  animated  na¬ 
ture. 

13.  Even  in  the  estimation  of  an  earthly  moralist, 
what  is  done  under  the  impulse  only  of  emotion  is 
of  a  specifically  distinct  character  from  what  is  done 
at  the  bidding  of  principle.  The  two  things  are 
disparate;  and  he  would  hold  it  untrue,  and  unphilo- 
sophical  to  confound  them.  They  have  nought 
of  a  common  quality  between  them  ;  or  at  least  the 
former  has  nought  whatever  of  that  ethical  quality 
which  belongs  to  the  latter,  and  which  imparts  to 
it  its  proper  designation  of  virtuousness.  The  man 
who  does  a  thing  because  pathologically  inclined 
to  do  it,  makes  a  different  exhibition  from  the  m^in 
who  does  the  same  thing  because  he  has  the  sense 
or  conviction  that  he  ought.  The  second  deed  is 
that  alone  which  should  have  desert  awarded  to  it. 
The  performer  of  the  first  deed  secures  no  more 
by  it  in  the  way  of  desert,  than  by  the  beauty  of 
his  complexion — no  more  by  the  gracefulness  of 
his  instinctive  and  unregulated  sensibilities  than  hy 
the  gracefulness  of  his  form.  Doubtless  he  may 
be  loved  because  of  his  fine  and  generous  suscepti¬ 
bilities  ;  but  so  also  may  he  he  loved  because  of  the 
attractions  of  his  personal  comeliness.  And  still 
it  holds  true,  that  no  act  should  have  the  merit  or 
the  praise  of  righteousness  awarded  to  it,  unless 
done  because  of  its  righteousness.  It  may  be 
done  in  the  garb  of  virtue  ;  but  to  claim  for  it  the 
rewards  or  the  honours  of  virtue  is  altogether  a 
delusion. 

14.  And  the  delusion  will  approve  itself  to  be 
all  the  more  aggravated,  if  we  take  into  view  the 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  239 

actual  state  of  humanity,  and  the  constitution  under 
which  we  are  placed  by  the  economy  of  the  gospel. 
We  are  made  welcome  to  all  the  privileges  and  the 
immunities  of  a  perfect  righteousness,  achieved 
for  us  by  another,  and  transferred  to  us,  if  we 
will  submit  to  such  an  investiture.  After  this, 
Christianity  refuses  to  entertain  the  claims  of  our 
own  imperfect  righteousness,  even  though  done 
under  a  sense  of  duty,  because  done  inadequately; 
or  even  though  done  to  the  full  acquittal  of  what  we 
owe  to  our  fellow  men,  because  short  of  a  great 
and  absolute  principle,  the  only  one  which  can  be 
sustained  under  the  high  jurisprudence  of  heaven-^- 
that  is  because  wanting  in  the  spirit  of  a  full  alle¬ 
giance  to  our  alone  rightful  lawgiver,  it  is  not  done 
unto  God.  If  then  the  plea  ot  our  own  righteous¬ 
ness  is  disowned  at  the  bar  of  the  Eternal,  because 
though  the  moral  ingredient  be  there,  it  is  there 
but  partially  and  insufficiently,  and  the  offering  - 
altogether  is  tainted  with  other  ingredients — what 
becomes  of  the  plea,  not  of  our  virtues  but  of  our 
sensibilities,  where  the  moral  ingredient  is  altogether 
wanting  ?  And  yet  the  delusive  imagination  of  a 
worth  and  a  merit  in  these  sensibilities,  is  very 
often  to  be  met  with  in  society ;  and  in  circum¬ 
stances  too,  where  it  is  most  painful  to  encounter 
it — as  when  the  bereaved  mother,  after  that  her 
infant  has  been  deposited  in  an  early  tomb, 
cherishes  the  treacherous  complacency  that  her 
tenderness  and  tears  will  arise  in  acceptable  me¬ 
morial  before  God ;  and  so  open  a  way  for  that 
heaven  where,  in  blissful  reunion  with  all  that  is 
dear  to  her,  she  wdll  be  compensated  at  the 


240  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

last  for  the  agony  of  her  now  wounded  affections. 
To  discourage  an  anticipation  so  fond  and  so  beau¬ 
tiful  as  this,  would  seem  to  require  a  certain 
amount  of  hardihood,  nay  might  provoke  the  anti¬ 
pathies  of  aggrieved  nature,  against  that  stern 
theology  which  knows  not  how  to  soften  or  relent 
even  before  the  most  gracefully  touching  of  all 
spectacles.  And  hence  the  exceeding  delicacy  of 
that  task,  which  often  comes  in  the  way  of  a  con¬ 
scientious  minister,  whose  duty  it  is  to  weep  with 
them  who  weep ;  but  who  must  not  forget  that 
Christianity  is  firm  as  well  as  merciful,  and,  while 
exuberant  of  comfort  to  all  who  comply  with  its 
overtures,  it  is  not  a  comfort  which  as  the  ambas¬ 
sador  of  his  Master  in  heaven  he  can  dare  to 
minister  at  the  expense  of  principle  and  truth. 

15.  But  not  only  does  a  right  view  of  the  emo¬ 
tions  enable  us  to  expose  this  great  practical  delu¬ 
sion.  We  have  long  thought  that  there  is  a 
view  which  might  be  taken  of  them,  that  would 
.ead  to  the  establishment  of  a  right  philosophy 
regarding  the  varieties  of  character  which  obtain 
among  men.  Those  laws,  by  which  certain  emo¬ 
tions  stand  related  to  certain  counterpart  objects, 
may  be  regarded  as  so  many  laws  of  human  nature 
— as  that  by  which  the  view  of  suffering,  is  follow^ed 
up  by  the  sense  of  compassion ;  and  that  by  which 
the  view  of  incongruity,  is  followed  up  by  a  sense 
of  ridicule ;  and  that  by  wdiich  the  view  of  novelty, 
is  followed  up  by  a  sense  of  wmnder  ;  and  that  by 
which  the  view  of  injustice,  is  followed  up  by  a 
sense  or  feeling  of  resentment ;  and  lastly  that  by 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  241 

which  the  view  of  grandeur  or  beauty,  is  followed 
up  by  a  sense  of  tasteful  ana  delighted  admiration. 
Now  while  it  is  impossible  not  to  admit  a  very 
wide  variety  both  of  taste  and  character  among 
men,  it  does  not  follow  that  in  any  instance  there 
has  taken  place  the  reversal  of  any  such  laws  as 
we  have  just  been  announcing.  That  is,  the  view 
of  another  s  pain,  if  the  naked  unaccompanied 
object  of  contemplation  at  the  time,  is  never  we 
apprehend  followed  up  by  any  other  emotion  than 
that  of  compassion  or  sympathy;  and  generally 
each  elementary  object  seen  simply  and  by  itself, 
divested  of*all  association  with  other  objects,  must 
awaken  in  every  bosom  its  own  appropriate  and 
counterpart  emotion — or,  in  other  words,  human 
nature  is  so  constituted,  and  maintains  such  a 
degree  of  identity  throughout  all  its  specimens,  as 
that  all  men  must  compassionate  distress,  must 
laugh  at  incongruity,  must  feel  surprised  at  novelty, 
must  resent  injustice,  must  admire  beauty _ pro¬ 

vided  that  these  objects  be  viewed  by  them  singly, 
or  that  these  and  no  others  be  present  to  the  mind 
for  the  time  beiiiff. 

O 

16.  But  how  then  does  it  consist  with  such  a 
representation,  that  men  are  so  differently  affect¬ 
ed  by  the  same  spectacle  ?  One  man  will  laugh, 
while  another  sheds  tears  of  pity  at  the  same  exhi¬ 
bition  of  distress.  The  very  combat  from  which 
some  wmuld  recoil  with  horror,  will  draw  around 
it  an  exulting  and  ferocious  multitude,  looking  on 
with  savage  glee  to  the  scene  of  violence,  and  find¬ 
ing  an  ultimate  satisfaction  in  the  death  of  one  or 
other  of  their  unhanpy  victims.  I'he  cold-blooded 

VOL.  V.  r 


242  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS, 

physiologist,  if  necessary  for  the  prosecution  of  his 
researches  into  the  laws  of  vitality  or  sensation, 
will  execute  some  process  of  lingering  torture 
which  himself  hath  devised — the  very  sight  of 
which  would  agonize  the  feelings  of  other  and 
ordinary  men.  And  then,  what  can  be  more 
palpable  than,  not  the  reluctance,  but  the  positive 
delight  w'hich  men  experience,  on  the  infliction  of 
pain — when  wreaking  their  ire  on  the  delinquent 
who  has  trespassed  upon  their  dignity  or  their  rights? 
In  these  and  manv  other  instances,  do  not  differ- 
ent  men  exhibit  what  may  be  termed  reverse 
phenomena ;  and  so  prove  of  different  human 
minds  that  the  same  object  will  excite  in  them 
respectively,  not  the  same,  but  very  different 
emotions  ? 

17.  But  it  is  forgotten  that,  in  one  and  the 
same  spectacle,  different  objects  may  be  presented 
to  us  ;  and  that  thus  one  or  other  of  the  emotions 
may  be  awakened  by  that  spectacle,  according 
as  one  or  other  of  the  objects  may  be  present 
to  the  mind.  Take  any  one  of  the  foregoin'g 
examples,  as  that  of  the  experimentalist  on  the 
laws  of  animal  physiology,  who  looks,  and  per¬ 
haps  with  delighted  interest,  to  the  evolution 
of  those  phenomena  which  are  called  forth  b}' 
the  quiverings  of  agonized  nature.  It  follows  not 
that  his  mind  is  so  differently  constituted  from 
that  of  other  men,  as  to  experience  any  other 
emotion  than  that  of  compassion  in  the  view  of 
pain,  if  beheld  simply  and  by  itself;  but,  in  this 
instance,  another  and  distinct  object  offers  itself  to 
the  mind,  even  that  of  discovery,  and  the  corre- 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  243 


sponding  emotion  is  evoked  by  it — that  either  of  an 
urgent  or  of  a  gratified  curiosity ;  and  so,  without 
any  reversal  of  the  general  law  of  all  minds,  even 
that  by  which  the  sight  of  pain  and  the  feeling  of 
sympathy  stand  related  to  each  other,  as  the 
terms  of  a  sequence,  is  the  latter  emotion  only 
kept  in  check,  or  overborne  by  the  superior  force 
of  another,  and  in  this  case,  a  more  powerful 
emotion.  Were  suffering  and  nothing  else  present 
to  his  mind,  sympathy  and  nothing  else  would  be 
called  forth  by  the  spectacle  before  him.  To  this 
extent,  we  hold  an  identity  among  all  men ;  and 
that  the  distinction  of  character  between  one  man 
and  another,  lies,  not  in  aught  so  anomalous  as 
that  each  mind  should  vary  from  all  the  rest  in 
having  its  own  peculiar  elementary  laws  of  emo¬ 
tion,  but  that  the  diversity  lies  in  the  different 
relative  strength  of  these  emotions — so  that  when 
two  or  more  come  into  play,  on  the  presentation 
of  one  and  the  same  spectacle,  the  result,  proceed¬ 
ing  in  all  instances  from  the  victory  of  the  stronger 
over  the  weaker,  will  depend  on  the  superior 
promptitude  or  power  of  one  emotion  in  one  mind, 
of  another  emotion  in  another  mind. 

18.  One  emotion  might  counteract  another  and 
prevail  over  it.  But  it  follows  not  that  the  weaker 
emotion  is  extinguished,  and  far  less  that  it  is  re¬ 
versed.  On  the  contrary,  if  we  wanted  the 
animal  experimentalist  to  desist  from  his  processes 
of  cruelty,  we  should  try  to  fix  his  attention  on  the 
agony  of  the  poor  sufferer — the  last  thing  wm 
should  do,  if  we  thought,  that,  in  opposition  to  the 
general  law,  there  was  a  delight  in  the  contem- 


244  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

plation  of  the  agony  even  viewed  by  itself  instead 
of  an  aversion  to  it.  If  indeed  there  be  a  reversal 
of  the  law  of  compassion  in  his  particular  case — 
then  to  expatiate  on  the  magnitude  of  the  pain  he 
was  inflicting,  were  the  way  of  luring  him  onward 
to  the  torture,  instead  of  causing  him  to  falter  from 
it — whereas  it  is  on  this  very  sensibility  that  we 
calculate,  and  to  which  we  make  our  appeal,  when, 
in  the  name  of  humanity,  we  ofler  our  remon¬ 
strances  against  some  dreadful  perpetration.  The 
workings  of  compassion,  indeed,  are  quite  obvious, 
even  in  the  very  descriptions  of  those  who  retail 
to  us  their  proceedings  in  this  horrid  walk  of  dis- 
coveiy — as  when  they  tie  up  particular  nerves, 
and  do  their  uttermost  to  lessen  the  pain  of  their 
ill-fated  victims,  save  when  necessary  for  the  eluci¬ 
dation  of  the  yet  secret  principle  they  are  in  quest 
of,  and  for  which  they  are  probing  their  way 
among  the  innermost  recesses  of  vitality  and  feel¬ 
ing.  The  hardihood  of  these  fell  inquisitors  does 
not  arise  from  a  mental  constitution  so  difFering 
with  that  of  other  men,  as  that  the  law  of  com¬ 
passion  is  repealed ;  and  an  opposite  law,  the  law 
of  cruelty,  is  substituted  in  its  place.  It  arises 
from  a  conflict  between  the  law  of  compassion, 
still  in  undoubted  operation  within  them,  and  a 
more  powerful  antagonist,  which  is  the  principle 
of  curiosity,  urging  them  onw'ard  to  a  deed  of 
inhumanity — not  because  of  the  sufferings  which 
are  thereby  inflicted,  but  truly  in  spite  of  these 
sutrerings.  The  same  holds  true  of  reveno-e 
which  willingly  inflicts  chastisement,  up  to  a  parti¬ 
cular  measure  or  amount  j  but  beyond  that  would 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  245 

begin  to  relent,  and  could  go  no  farther.  It  is 
not  that  the  sympathy  only  begins  at  this  point ; 
but  this  is  the  point  at  which  it  becomes  so  power¬ 
ful  as  then  to  prevail  over  the  resentment.  Beneath 
this  point  it  existed,  though  less  powerfully — over¬ 
borne,  but  never  obliterated.  The  differing 
results,  in  these  cases  of  mental  dynamics,  do  not 
arise  from  any  difference  in  the  kind,  but  only  in 
the  composition  of  the  forces — even  as  in  the 
material  world,  the  results  may  be  infinitely  varied, 
only  by  the  forces  being  variously  compounded, 
while  there  obtain  the  same  laws  of  impulse  in  all. 

19.  If  there  be  truth  in  this  speculation,  then, 
moral  deformity,  even  in  its  most  frightful  exhibi¬ 
tions,  might  arise,  not  from  a  reversal  of  any  of 
the  good  or  benevolent  emotions,  but  only  from 
their  defect — from  the  want  and  weakness  of 
certain  of  the  emotions,  and  the  prevalence  of 
others  over  them.  For  a  man  to  be  a  monster, 
he  does  not  need  to  have  an  abstract  love  of 
cruelty — he  does  not  need  to  be  under  the  impulse 
of  an  emotion,  the  direct  opposite  of  compassion — . 
it  is  enough  that  he  be  without  compassion,  or 
rather,  that  it  should  be  so  inert  and  inoperative, 
as  to  present  a  feeble  barrier,  when  the  tempta¬ 
tions  of  cupidity  or  revenge  would  hurry  him 
onwards  to  the  fulfilment  of  these  other  desires, 
though  at  the  expense  of  blood  and  violence.  To 
be  an  unnatural  son,  it  is  not  necessary  that  the 
instinct  of  relationship  should  be  converted  into 
its  opposite — it  is  enough  that  the  instinct  be 
wanting — that  he  te  without  natural  aflectioii — so 
that  if  the  accursed  love  of  ^old  shall  have  the 


246  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

mastery  over  him,  the  affection  shall  not  stand  in 
the  way,  when  he  either  leaves  a  father  to  starve, 
or  even  lifts  the  hand  of  a  parricide  to  destroy 
him.  There  is  not  an  atrocity  of  human  wicked¬ 
ness,  which  might  not  be  resolved  this  way,  into 
mutilation  or  defect — and  so  as  strikingly  to 
confirm  the  views  of  the  old  schoolmen  on  the 
privative  character  of  evil.  They  might,  one  and 
all  of  them,  be  characterised  by  negations,  as 
unfeeling,  inhuman,  cold-blooded,  heartless — all 
which  terms  bespeak  not  the  reversal  of  any  of 
the  emotions,  but  the  indefinite  reduction  of 
certain  of  them  towards  zero — so  that  the  other 
emotions  might  hold  unresisted  sway  over  the 
man,  whose  mental  constitution  has  lost  the 
balance  of  the  average  or  every-day  character  in 
society. 

20.  But  this  variety  of  character  between  one 
man  and  another  does  not  proceed  altogether  from 
a  difference  in  the  pathological  constitutions.  The 
direction  and  habit  of  their  attention  towards  one 
object  rather  than  another,  have  an  important 
share  in  the  explanation.  And  we  have  already 
laboured  to  demonstrate  the  importance  of  atten¬ 
tion  as  a  faculty,  that,  to  a  great  extent,  is  under 
the  control  of  the  will — and  therefore  a  faculty  for 
the  exercise  of  which  we  are  morally  responsible  ; 
insomuch  that  through  its  means  the  mind  may 
keep  itself  perpetually  awake  to  one  set  of  the 
emotions,  and  either  shut  out  or  bid  away  another 
set  of  them.  It  is  thus  that  though  one  certain 
emotion  were  the  rigid  and  necessary  result  of  die 
mind  being  in  contact,  either  by  outward  perception 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  247 

or  by  thought,  witli  a  given  object — yet,  never¬ 
theless,  the  state  of  our  emotions  is  to  a  certain 
degree  dependent  upon  the  will ;  seeing  that  the 
will  can  make  its  escape  from  one  object,  and  shift 
or  transfer  its  regards  to  another — and  thus,  by 
the  simple  power  of  attention,  become  alive  to 
those  emotions  which  it  chooses  to  uphold,  and 
become  dead  to  those  which  it  chooses  to  extin¬ 
guish.  We  have  already  instanced,  and  with 
sufficient  explicitness,  how  it  is  that  a  sense  of  the 
duty  of  beneficence  gives  such  a  direction  to  this 
faculty  of  attention,  as  both  to  stimulate  and  up¬ 
hold  within  us  our  emotions  of  sympathy  with 
distress — and  how,  at  the  same  time,  it  withdraws 
the  mind  from  those  objects  that  might  else  have 
lighted  up  the  quick  emotion  of  impatience  and 
disgust,  and  so  have  driven  us  away  from  the 
services  of  charity.  And  this  enabled  us  to  pre¬ 
sent  a  comparative  estimate  as  to  character  and 
worth,  between  the  benevolence  of  a  steady  con¬ 
scientious  hard-working  principle,  and  the  bene¬ 
volence  of  a  soft  and  weeping  sentimentalism. 

21.  In  this  case  the  attention  in  the  act  of 
fixing  itself  upon  one  object,  is  withdrawn  from 
the  objects  that  are  placed  perhaps  at  some  little 
distance  and  separately  around  it — just  as  when 
on  looking  with  intentness  to  the  sickly  and  im¬ 
ploring  visage  of  an  agonized  sufferer,  we  could 
not  at  the  same  time  look  to  the  sensitive  and 
even  to  the  moral  abominations  that  oft  are  huddled 
together  in  the  same  apartment  with  that  extreme 
wretchedness  which  is  before  us.  This  we  have 
already  adverted  to,  and  to  the  important  operation 


248  UNDUK  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

of  it  in  bearing  onward  the  virtues  of  principle  to 
their  final  accomplishment.  But  it  has  not  yet 
Deen  so  distinctly  insisted  on,  that  in  one  and  the 
same  object  there  are  blended  together  various 
characteristics,  on  any  one  of  which  the  attention 
may  singly  be  fastened ;  and  if  singly,  then  exclu¬ 
sively.  Thus  great  distress  and  great  depravity 
may  meet  together  upon  one  object — and,  such 
may  our  attention  be  to  the  former,  that  the  sym¬ 
pathy  awakened  thereby  is  not  at  all  deadened 
from  our  view  of  the  latter ;  or,  there  may  be 
great  distress  and  most  loathsome  disgustfulness — 
yet,  such  may  be  the  power  of  a  stedfast  and 
unfaltering  regard  upon  the  one,  that  the  other 
cannot  dispost  compassion  from  its  rightful  pre- 
ponderancy — and  so,  though  the  will  cannot  abro¬ 
gate  that  pathological  law  of  our  nature  by  which 
a  given  object  stands  related  with  its  corresponding 
emotion,  yet  the  will  can  select  an  object  or  one 
feature  of  an  object  out  of  several  more,  and  by 
bolding  it  before  the  eye  of  the  mind  can  both 
bring  the  right  emotion  into  the  heart,  and  send 
forth  the  right  impulse  upon  the  history. 

22.  The  most  striking  example  of  two  emotions 
very  unlike  tlie  one  to  the  other,  and  yet  capable 
of  being  excited,  not  merely  by  the  same  object 
but  by  the  same  event  or  circumstance  that  hath 
befallen  it,  is  that  of  mirth  when  the  object  is 
viewed  in  one  light,  and  of  sympathy  when  it  is 
viewed  in  another.  A  sense  of  the  ludicrous 
arises  from  the  sudden  perception  of  some  unlooked 
for  incongruity  in  the  objects  that  are  placed  before 
us — a  theory  wliich  becomes  still  more  compre- 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  249 

hensive  of  the  phenomena  of  laughter,  when,  in 
the  language  of  Dr.  Brown,  the  perception  is 
farther  extended  from  that  of  incongruity  in  images 
supposed  to  be  congruous,  to  that  of  unexpected 
congruity  developed  in  images  that  were  before 
supposed  to  be  opposite  in  kind.  He  adds,  that, 
“  the  sudden  perception  of  these  discrepancies  and 
agreements  may  be  said  to  be  that  which  consti¬ 
tutes  the  ludicrous — the  gay  emotions  being  imme¬ 
diately  subsequent:  to,  the  mere  perception  of  the 
unexpected  relation.** 

23.  It  is  a  most  instructive  thing  on  the  subject 
of  human  character,  to  observe  how  differently 
the  same  exhibition  tells  upon  two  individuals. 
The  fall  of  an  acquaintance  may  either  amuse  or 
alarm  us,  according  as  we  look  to  the  awkwardness 
of  the  fall  or  to  its  severity.  It  is  thus  that  two 
men  looking  to  the  same  fall  may  be  so  differently 
affected  by  it — the  one  in  the  first  way,  the  other 
in  the  second.  We  cannot  fix  with  either  of  them 
on  the  very  point,  when  the  awkwardness  and  the 
severity  are  so  compromised,  as  to  bring  the  mind 
into  a  midway  or  debateable  state  between  the 
gay  and  the  serious  emotion.  But  we  can  see 
very  clearly,  that,  with  various  characters,  the 
point  is  variously  situated ;  that  one  will  cease  to 
laugh  and  begin  to  feel  much  sooner  than  another ; 
that  with  some  spectators  it  would  require  a  much 
larger  degree  of  suffering  to  stop  their  merriment 
— and  so  a  gradation  is  observable,  from  those 
who  by  the  slightest  reflection  on  the  pain  that 
may  have  been  incurred  would  instantly  change 
the  mood  of  their  spirits,  to  those  again  who  could 


250  UNDL'P  n.ACK  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMIITIONS. 

Still  look  spofliv-ely  o.'-.,  atnl  send  forth  an  ecstasy 
of  inhuinan  delight  in  the  ihce  of  agony  the  most 
palpable  and  excruciating. 

24.  It  were  well  that  we  looked  with  observant 
eye  even  upon  the  most  familiar  exhibitions  of  our 
nature — and  we  therefore  make  no  apology  for 
fetching  our  illustrations,  from  the  scenes  and  the 
recollections  of  our  every-day  experience. 

25.  We  may  have  remembered  witnessing  the 
difference  that  we  now  speak  of  among  children 
of  the  same  family — a  certain  mischievous  roguery 
practised  by  so  many  of  them  on  the  domestic 
animals,  and  that  involved  in  it  some  degree  at 
least  of  suffering — and  the  revolt  of  pained  and 
offended  sensibility  that  was  felt  in  consequence 
by  some  others  of  them.  W'e  might  particularly 
instance  of  the  boys,  how  it  was  a  sense  of  the 
ludicrous  that  chiefly  predominated  with  them — 
while  the  girls,  with  the  characteristic  tenderness 
of  their  sex,  are  most  alive  to  the  sympathy — and 
accordingly  upon  these  occasions,  the  former  were 
generally  brought  in  as  the  defaulters,  and  the 
latter  appeared  as  the  informers  or  the  plaintiffs, 
moved  alike  with  pity  towards  suffering,  and  with 
indignation  against  the  wanton  infliction  of  it. 

26.  Again,  we  may  oft  have  witnessed  how  soon 
the  ludicrous  propensity  that  had  been  excited  by 
a  fall,  was  checked  and  superseded  by  the  other 
emotion  in  one  set  of  spectators,  on  discovery  that 
some  hurt  had  been  sustained — yet  not  universally 
so,  for  the  very  limp  or  contortion  or  vociferous 
outcry  that  gave  evidence  to  the  pain,  would  just 
minister  food  to  this  propensity  with  another  set  of 


UNDUli  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  251 

spectators,  and  cause  them  break  forth  into  a  still 
louder  ecstasy  than  before. 

27.  Nay  it  is  even  conceivable,  and  we  do  think 
fairly  within  the  probabilities  of  a  nature  so  varie¬ 
gated  in  its  specimens  as  ours — that  some  very 
dreadful  result  may  have  come  out  of  such  an 
accident— and  weeping  relatives  may  have  congre¬ 
gated  around  it — and  altogether  the  character  of 
the  thing  in  itself,  as  well  as  its  accompaniments, 
may  be  just  tragical  enough  to  have  arrested  into 
a  grave  and  even  afflictive  sympathy  the  general 
multitude' who  had  flocked  to  witness  it — yet  not 
so  tragical  as  to  have  carried  a  certain  few  of 
hardier  temperament  over  the  march  of  separation 
between  a  state  of  levity  and  a  state  of  seriousness 
—insomuch  that  one  can  figure  a  few  stout  and 
confirmed  associates  in  blackguardism,  who  might 
stand  their  ground  against  a  representation  that 
softened  all  but  themselves,  and  even  lift  up  the 
shout  of  a  brutal  exultation,  though  they  had  to 
make  instantaneous  escape  from  the  indignancy  of 
a  crowd  who  thought  more  correctly  and  felt  more 
tenderly  than  they. 

28.  It  is  painful  to  follow  out  these  exhibitions 
of  our  species  into  the  cases  of  a  still  more  mon¬ 
strous  and  unequivocal  atrocity — when  a  savage 
enjoyment  seems  to  be  felt  in  the  very  spectacle 
'  of  human  agony — when  the  writhings  of  a  sentient 
creature  in  torment  can  be  looked  upon,  not  with 
coldness  alone,  but  with  positive  complacency — as 
in  the  cruelties  of  an  Indian  torture,  which  are  not 
only  witnessed  but  inflic.ted  with  barbarian  trans¬ 
port  upon  its  unhafipy  victim  5  or  in  those  religioua 


252  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

martyrdoms,  when  the  tyrants  of  ancient  or  the 
inquisitors  of  modern  Rome,  could,  from  some 
proud  and  purple  eminence,  feast  their  eyes  on  the 
last  quiverings  of  agonized  nature. 

29.  Yet,  in  spite  of  all  these  authentic  displays 
which  have  been  given  of  the  character  of  man,  we 
are  not  able  to  say  that  the  wretchedness  of  one 
man  is  the  object  of  delight  to  another  for  its  own 
sake — or  that  when  viewed  singly  and  apart  from 
every  accompaniment,  there  is  any  other  emotion 
within  the  limits  of  our  nature  beside  that  of  sym¬ 
pathy  which  will  respond  to  it.  The  importance 
of  this  question  must  excuse  our  dwelling  upon  it 
— for  we  hold  it  to  be  both  most  interesting  in  it¬ 
self,  and  most  pregnant  with  inference  and  useful 
application  in  the  science  of  morals.  The  ques¬ 
tion  is — whether,  when  any  suffering  is  viewed  by 
itself  and  as  a  separate  object  of  contemplation, 
there  be  a  proper  and  primitive  tendency  in  any 
human  mind  whatever  to  any  other  emotion  than 
that  of  sympathy — so  as  that  ivhen  one  man  looks 
on  with  pleasure  and  another  with  pain,  it  is  be¬ 
cause  of  such  a  difference  in  their  pathological  con¬ 
stitutions,  that  even  though  the  very  same  object 
should  be  regarded-  singly  by  each,  it  is  followed 
up  in  them  by  wholly  opposite  emotions :  Or,  whe¬ 
ther  the  difference  is  not  rather  owing  to  this,  that, 
while  the  one  may  be  looking  singly  to  the  object  by 
which  compassion  is  awakened  and  feels  it  accord¬ 
ingly,  the  other  is  looking  to  a  distinct  object  and 
is  therefore  under  the  power  of  a  distinct  emotion. 
Both  may  be  looking  at  the  same  time  to  a  sen¬ 
tient  creature  in  distiessi  and  were  both  looking 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  253 

to  the  distress  alone,  the  one  with  sympathy  and 
the  other  with  satisfaction,  then  we  should  under¬ 
stand  that  each  was  under  a  different  law,  in  re¬ 
gard  to  the  kind  of  emotion  in  the  heart  that  fol¬ 
lowed  up  the  view  of  one  and  the  same  object  in 
the  mind.  And  the  question  is,  whether  this  be 
really  so  ;  or  whether  it  is  not  rather  that,  though 
each  be  looking  to  the  same  object  in  the  gross, 
that  is  to  a  fellow-creature  in  agony — yet  each  is 
looking  to  a  different  thing,  distinct  the  one  from 
the  other,  though  each  suggested  no  doubt  by  the 
view  of  this  fellow-creature — in  which  case  the 
compassion  of  the  first  observer  and  the  cruelty  of 
the  second  would  not  arise  from  this,  that  the 
same  simple  object  awakened  two  different  emo¬ 
tions  in  two  different  breasts — but  it  would  arise 
from  this,  that  the  same  complex  object  suggested 
two  simple  objects  that  were  distinct  the  one  from 
the  other ;  and  that,  solely  on  account  of  the  dif¬ 
ference  of  these  last  suggested  objects  it  was,  that 
the  emotions  were  different. 

30.  Should  this  really  be  the  case,  then  there 
might  be  no  such  thing  as  abstract  delight  in 
another’s  pain — and,  strong  as  certain  appearances 
may  be  to  the  contrary,  we  feel  strongly  inclined 
to  this  opinion.  We  have  already  seen  that  the 
two  distinct  objects  of  awkwardness  and  severity 
might  be  blended  together  into  one  exhibition. 
When  we  look  to  the  former  of  them  we  laugh ; 
but  could  we  become  altogether  rid  of  that  con¬ 
ception  and  transfer  our  mind  wholly  to  the  latter 
of  them,  we  should  sympathize.  We  may  remem¬ 
ber  the  entervumnent  wiierewith  we  have  looked 


254  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  '^HE  EMOTIONS, 

to  the  juvenile  eiToris  ul'  very  young  eliikireii, 
when  they  attempt  to  draw  the  human  figure,  and 
set  before  us  some  grotesque  picture  of  dispropor¬ 
tion  or  deformity.  This  is  purely  ludicrous  ;  but 
it  is  a  ludicrous  thing  that  may  be  realized  in  the 
distortions  of  the  countenance,  or  those  writhings 
of  the  body,  or  even  those  mutilations,  that  are 
caused  by  the  inflictions  of  violence  upon  the 
human  frame — and  monsters  there  are,  who,  over¬ 
looking  the  anguish,  could  make  their  barbarous 
frolic  with  the  mere  uncouthness  of  its  visible  in¬ 
dications.  Still  it  is  of  importance  to  know,  that 
a  something  else  than  the  mere  naked  pain  of  the 
sufferer,  hath  occasioned  this  levity  on  the  part  of 
one  of  the  spectators — that  if  his  heart  have  been 
occupied  with  another  emotion  from  that  of  the 
compassionate  spectator,  it  is  because  his  mind 
hath  been  occupied  with  another  object — that  if 
he  feel  in  a  wrong  way  it  is  because  he  looks  in  a 
wrong  way — and  what  makes  him  the  rightful 
subject  of  deepest  moral  indignation  is  not,  that, 
with  a  ludicrous  object  once  in  possession  of  his 
mind,  a  sense  of  the  ludicrous  should  lord  it  over 
him — but  that  in  such  circumstances  he  could 
attend  to  the  ludicrous  at  all — that  he  had  eyes 
for  any  thing  else  than  the  helpless  and  imploring 
agony  which  was  depicted  before  him — that  with 
such  resistless  claims  as  the  pleading  voice  and 
the  piteous  look  of  a  fellow-mortal  in  some  dire 
extremity  of  wretchedness  had  upon  his  attention, 
he  should  gaze  u])on  any  thing  else,  he  should 
turn  him  to  any  other  quarter  of  contemplation. 

31.  And  here  it  should  be  remembered  that  we 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  255 


do  not  look  on  the  emotion  of  ridicule  as  the  only 
one,  by  which  the  emotion  of  sympathy  can  be 
ovei'borne.  This  were  far  from  an  adequate 
explanation  of  cruelty,  or  of  the  apparent  delight 
wherewith  one  man  can  regard  the  sufferings  of 
another,  or  even  lift  his  own  arm  for  the  purpose  of 
inflicting  them.  There  are  many  other  emotions 
by  which  that  of  sympathy  may  be  displaced — yet 
all  of  them  serve  to  confirm  our  general  theory — 
that  there  is  nought  in  the  one  object  of  distress  to 
awaken  any  thing  else  than  compassion  in  any 
bosom — but  that  this  object  may  be  so  complicated 
with  others,  as  that  it  cannot  be  regarded  without 
the  suggestion  of  these  others  to  the  mind;  and 
without  making  it  possible  for  the  will  to  pick  and 
choose  amongst  them  as  it  were,  and  to  select  that 
one  object  upon  which  the  attention  shall  dwell — 
and  it  is  by  this  volition,  whether  only  conceived 
once  and  easily  persevered  in  afterwards,  or 
whether  like  to  falter  among  the  horrors  of  the 
scene  it  had  to  be  upheld  by  many  subsequent 
volitions  or  by  a  strenuous  or  sustained  effort  of 
resolution — it  is  by  this  volition  we  say  that  the 
whole  atrocity  and  guilt  of  savage  cruelty  is  in¬ 
curred.  Now  a  ludicrous  object  is  certainly  one 
of  those  which  may  withdraw  the  mind  from  the 
proper  object  of  sympathy — but  it  is  far  from  being 
the  only  one.  Tliere  might  be  the  animating  plea¬ 
sure  of  the  chase,  as  in  hunting — there  might  be  the 
general  appetite  for  excitement,  as  at  those  execu¬ 
tions  when  multitudes  assemble  and  many  weep  over 
the  tragedy  that  is  acted  there — there  might  be  an 
urgent  lust  after  money,  an  in  the  robbers  of  the 


256  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

highway — there  might  be  a  domineering  ambition 
that  must  clear  away  every  obstacle  in  its  career, 
and  ratber  wade  in  blood  than  not  reach  the  pin¬ 
nacle  of  splendour  or  of  fame  from  which  its  eye 
never  wavers — there  might  be  the  ardour  of  scien¬ 
tific  discovery,  or  perhaps  the  vanity  of  displaying 
it,  as  in  those  shocking  experiments  that  are  made 
upon  animal  life  and  animal  sensation — there  might 
be  a  keen  sense  of  injustice  goading  impetuously 
forward  to  revenge,  as  in  war  among  the  sons  of 
boasted  civilization,  when  the  scaled  and  the 
stormed  city  is  devoted  to  the  massacre  of  its 
families ;  or  in  war  among  savages,  when  all  the 
ingenuities  of  torture  are  heaped  upon  a  single 
captive,  and  a  whole  tribe  holds  jubilee  over  the 
dreadful  perpetration.  Even  in  these  most  aggra¬ 
vated  instances,  we  still  hold  that  there  is  no  such 
thing  as  cruelty  in  the  abstract — that  the  law  of 
our  nature  by  which  the  sight  of  distress  brings  on 
the  feeling  of  commiseration  is  not  reversed  even 
then,  but  only  overpowei'ed  by  other  and  at  the 
time  stronger  laws.  It  is  of  importance  as  a 
philosophical  tenet — and  we  deem  of  still  mightier 
importance  in  its  practical  applications,  if  it  shall 
be  found  that  even  in  the  worst  cases  of  cruelty, 
the  emotion  of  sympathy  at  the  sight  of  suffering 
hath  not  been  changed  into  its  opposite — but  it  hath 
only  been  supplanted  by  other  and  at  the  moment 
painfuller  emotions. 

32.  The  great  law  of  our  sentient  nature  differs 
not  even  among  the  agents  of  an  Indian  execution, 
from  that  which  obtains  auiong  all  the  other  mem¬ 
bers  of  the  great  human  family.  The  appropriate 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  257 

emotion  to  distress,  nmong  savages  too,  is  one  of 
tenderness — and  it  only  appears  otherwise  because 
warped  and  complicated  with  other  emotions. 
The  cruelty  is  indicted,  not  because  of  the  pleasure 
it  affords  to  the  perpetrators,  but  in  spite  of  its 
painfulness — and  they  need  the  most  powerful 
stimulants  to  urge  them  onward.  In  this  scene 
of  horrors  there  are  many  elements  at  work ;  and 
when  one  bethinks  him  of  the  fell  revenge,  and  the 
glory  that  is  there  ascrilied  to  the  suppression  of 
all  the  womanish  sensibilities,  and  the  spiriting  on 
of  the  young  to  acts  of  daring  hardihood,  and 
above  all  the  superstitious  imagination  that  by 
every  pang  which  the  captive  is  made  to  feel  a 
fresh  gleam  of  delight  shoots  into  the  souls  of  those 
relatives  who  have  fallen — there  might  be  enough 
to  convince  us  even  here,  that  the  law  by  which 
distress  and  sympathy  are  linked  together  is  still 
the  unexcepted  law  of  our  nature — though  its 
operation  be  suspended  at  the  time  when  the  mind, 
wholly  occupied  with  other  objects,  resigns  itself 
wholly  to  the  play  of  other  emotions. 

33.  It  is  a  question  of  far  greater  practical  im¬ 
portance  than  it  may  appear  at  first  sight,  whether 
the  same  simple  object,  Avhen  viewed  alone  by  any 
two  individuals,  is  not  always  followed  up  by  one 
and  the  same  simple  emotion,  with  greater  or  less 
degrees  of  sensibility  no  doubt  according  to  the 
habit  and  temperament  of  each  ;  but  still,  with  the 
very  same  emotion  in  kind,  though  greatly  different 
it  may  be  in  intensity.  For  if  it  be  really  the 
same,  then  the  obvious  lesson  is,  that,  to  secure  a 
right  state  of  emotion  iu  the  heart,  we  have  nothing 


258  undue  place  given  to  the  emotions. 

to  do  but  to  look  steadily  at  the  appropriate  object 
Avitli  the  eye  of  the  mind — steadily  resisting  the 
intrusion  of  all  other  objects,  that  might  draw  us 
away  from  that  one,  which  it  is  mainly  and  pro¬ 
perly  our  business  to  attend  to.  We  may  thus  be 
made  to  see  how  great  and  powerful  an  instrument 
attention  is,  in  the  business  of  moral  discipline — 
not  that  it  can  change  the  laws  of  pathology — ^but 
that  it  can  convey  the  mind,  as  it  were,  to  the 
right  place  where  that  one  law  operates,  by  which 
there  is  awakened  within  us  the  right  and  the 
desirable  emotion — not  that  it  can  reverse  any  one 
succession  in  the  processes  of  pathology,  causing 
the  pain  of  another  for  example  to  produce  com¬ 
passion  if  it  before  produced  levity  in  our  bosoms ; 
but  that  it  can  recall  us  from  the  contemplation  of 
that  object  which  gave  rise  to  the  levity,  to  the 
contemplation  of  that  other  object  which  when 
viewed  with  stedfast  and  undistracted  regard,  al¬ 
ways  will  give  rise  to  the  compassion.  It  prevents 
a  waste  of  exertion,  w  hen,  in  the  business  of  moral 
culture,  w'e  distinguish  aright  what  w'e  can  do  from 
what  we  cannot  do.  We  cannot  so  alter  the 
economy  of  mind,  as  to  dissolve  the  connexion  that 
subsists  betw'een  the  certain  object  and  its  certain 
emotion — any  more  than  we  can  alter  the  laws  of 
attraction  or  impulse  in  the  material  economy. 
But  it  is  much  if  we  can,  by  a  faculty  that  is  in 
any  degree  under  the  control  of  will,  bring  our 
mind  into  contact  with  one  object  and  withdraw  it 
from  another.  It  is  thus,  in  fact  that  we  might 
escape  from  one  emotion,  and  submit  ourselves 
to  the  power  of  another.  It  is  thus,  and  thus 


VNDUE  PL.4CE  fJJYliN  TC  TII.T  EMOTIONS.  259 

alone,  we  apprehend,  that  we  are  responsible  for 
cur  emotions. 

34.  It  must  now  be  quite  palpable,  why  it  is 
that  the  object  of  a  sentient  and  at  the  same  time 
suffering  creature,  awakens  such  very  different 
emotions  in  the  bosoms  of  different  individuals — 
the  mental  eye  of  each,  though  directed  to  the 
same  object  in  the  gross,  in  fact,  resting  upon 
separate  parts  of  it  distinct  and  diverse  the  one 
from  the  other — the  first  perhaps  engaged  with  a 
view  of  the  suffering  alone,  as  in  the  case  of  the 
philanthropist — the  second  with  some  comic  exhi¬ 
bition  afforded  by  the  cries  or  movements  of  the 
sufferer,  as  in  the  case  of  some  reckless  and  unfeel¬ 
ing  reprobate — the  third  with  his  guilt,  as  in  the 
case  of  that  man  whom  he  may  have  deeply  injured, 
and  who  now  breathes  vindictiveness  against  him 
— and,  lastly,  for  we  cannot  count  up  all  the  varie¬ 
ties,  the  fourth  with  some  striking  or  singular 
exhibition  that  he  makes  of  himself  in  the  moments 
of  his  anguish,  as  in  the  case  of  a  spectator  at  a 
public  execution,  who  eyes  the  wretched  victim 
with  intense  curiosity,  or  as  the  philosopher  does 
when  he  prosecutes  his  bloody  experiments  on  the 
physiology  of  animals.  It  is  thus  that  neither  the 
man  of  compassion,  nor  the  man  of  cruelty,  may 
delight  himself  with  pain  when  viewed  in  its  state 
of  abstract  and  unmingled  separation — and  that 
when  the  latter  rejoices,  either  in  the  view  or  in 
the  infliction  of  it,  it  is  not  that  the  law  which 
connects  suffering  with  sympathy  differs  in  his 
mind  from  that  of  another — but  it  is  that,  looking 
to  somewhat  else  than  the  mere  suffering  of  the 


2G0  UNDUr,  I’l.ACE  GIVEN'  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

object,  he  liath  resigned  himself  to  some  other 
emotion  by  which  the  emotion  of  sympathy  is  over¬ 
borne. 

35.  There  is  instruction  to  be  gathered  upon 
this  topic,  even  from  the  dreadful  mysteries  of  a 
slaughter-house.  We  may  have  heard  of  the 
lingering  deaths  that  many  an  animal  has  to  under¬ 
go,  for  the  gratification  of  a  refined  epicurism.  It 
were  surely  most  desirable  that  the  duties,  if  they 
may  be  so  called,  of  a  most  revolting  trade,  were 
all  of  them  got  over  with  the  least  possible  expense 
of  suffering — nor  do  we  ever  feel  so  painfully  the 
impression  of  a  lurking  cannibalism  in  our  nature, 
as  when  we  think  of  the  intense  study  which  has 
been  given  to  the  connexion,  between  the  mode  of 
killing  and  the  flavour  or  delicacy  of  those  viands 
that  are  served  up,  to  the  mild  and  pacific  and 
gentle-looking  creatures,  who  form  the  grace  and 
ornament  of  our  polished  society.  One  is  almost 
tempted,  after  all,  to  pronounce  them  so  many 
savages  in  disguise — and  upon  this  subject  we  are 
forcibly  reminded  of  that  scriptural  image,  “  the 
whole  creation  groaning  and  travailing  together  in 
pain”  because  of  that  arch  devourer  man,  who 
stands  pre-eminent  over  the  fiercest  children  of  the 
wilderness  as  an  animal  of  prey.  But  we  must  readi¬ 
ly  allow,  that,  on  the  part  of  the  consumer  in  this 
process,  the  law  which  binds  together  a  view  of 
suffering  with  a  feeling  of  sympathy  is  not  reversed 
— for,  in  truth,  the  suffering  is  not  in  the  view  at 
all ;  it  is  scarcely,  if  ever,  thought  of.  And  as  to 
those  again  whose  bloody  hands  have  perpetrated 
the  deed  of  violence,  we  believe,  that  if  one  w«‘re 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  2o  1 

to  look,  with  an  observant  eye  on  the  elements 
which  be  at  work,  or  which  have  previously  (  t-eu 
at  work  within  them,  it  will  be  found,  that,  in  k  * 
one  instance,  is  the  alacrity  wherewith  they  can 
plunge  the  knife  into  a  warm  and  palpitating  bosom, 
resolvible  into  a  process,  the  opposite  of  that  by 
which  the  simple  view  of  pain,  gives  rise  to  the 
simple  emotion  of  pity.  It  is  not  in  consequence 
of  any  such  opposite  law,  but  in  spite  of  the  uni¬ 
versal  law  of  humanity.  Upon  inquiry  into  the 
education  of  butchers,  it  will  be  found,  that, 
instead  of  receiving  aid  from  any  original  law  of 
nature  in  their  bosoms,  by  which  the  pain  of 
another  was  followed  up  with  pleasure  in  oneself — 
that,  instead  of  this,  all  the  relentings  of  nature 
had  to  be  overcome — a  struggle  had  to  be  made, 
and  other  emotions  were  pressed  into  the  service, 
that  the  one  troublesome  emotion  of  sympathy, 
might  be  effectually  overruled.  We  can  be  at  no 
loss  to  understand  what  these  other  emotions  or 
influences  are — the  absolute  need  of  a  livelihood — 
the  love  of  gain — even  the  family  affections  coming 
into  play,  when  the  connexion  was  adverted  to 
between  the  business  of  one’s  profession  and  a  pro¬ 
vision  for  his  children — and  then,  there  is  the  spirit¬ 
ing  on  of  the  uninitiated — the  factitious  conjuring 
up  even  of  something  like  a  sense  of  honour,  in  the 
manly  acquittal  of  themselves,  on  their  first  or  earli¬ 
est  attempts  at  the  trade  of  slaughter — the  rivalsuip 
of  young  apprentices,  with  whom  a  resolute  and 
unshrinking  hardihood  will  confer  the  same  proud 
distinction,  that  adventure  does  in  the  chase,  or 
that  prowess  does  in  war — and,  opposite  to  this, 


262  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS, 

the  contempt  of  all  his  fellows,  should  any  one 
falter  or  fall  away  at  the  moment  of  execution — a 
tenderness  of  spirit  incurring  the  very  same  re¬ 
proach  among  the  members  of  this  profession,  that 
a  fearfulness  of  spirit  or  cowardice  does  among  the 
members  of  another.  These  are  the  strong 
elements  by  which  strong  emotions  are  fetched 
up  on  the  heart  from  other  quarters,  and  all  of 
which  are  often  necessary  to  be  put  into  operation, 
ere  its  native  sympathies  can  be  overpowered. 
After  which,  we  admit,  that  a  feebler  principle 
than  any  of  these  may  be  able  to  carry  it  over  the 
now  tamed  and  subdued  sensibilities,  which  at  the 
outset  were  so  difficultly  brought  under.  Even  a 
principle,  so  feeble  as  that  of  an  idle  or  professional 
curiosity,  might  then  lead  these  stout  and  hacknied 
practitioners,  to  deeds  of  atrocious  wantonness. 
The  most  appalling  confession  that  we  ever  heard 
upon  this  subject,  was  given  by  one  of  the  brother¬ 
hood  with  whom  upon  this  very  topic,  we  deemed 
it  of  importance  to  hold  a  most  minute  and  search¬ 
ing  conversation ;  and  who  reported  of  one  of  his 
fellow-savages,  that,  instead  of  the  one  deep  and 
deadly  incision  which  he  ought  to  have  given,  it 
was  his  habit  at  times  to  do  the  work  by  halves, 
and  then  suspend  the  wounded  animal  by  the  feet 
when  it  had  to  welter  long  in  agony  ere  it  expired. 
The  recital  is  just  distressing  enough — but  we 
resolved,  if  possible,  to  get  at  the  motive  which 
could  prompt  so  horrid  a  barbarity — and  the 
ipsissima  verba  of  the  explanation  was  “  that  he 
just  wanted  to  see  how  it  w'ould  carry  on.”  The 
truth  is,  that,  at  this  stage  of  their  education,  the 


UNDUE  PLACE  CrIVEN  TO  TUE  EMOTIONS.  263 

suflerings  which  they  infliet  are  about  as  much  out 
of  sight  as  they  are  out  of  sympathy.  T.'hey  posi¬ 
tively  do  not  think  of  them.  They  are  not  present 
to  the  mind  by  reflection — and  therefore  it  is  that 
they  are  not  present  to  the  heart  in  the  way  of 
commiseration.  The  insensibility  and  the  incon¬ 
sideration  are  strongly  and  intimately  linked  the 
one  with  the  other.  In  the  act  of  felling  a  sentient 
creature,  and  dividing  it  into  fragments,  he  no 
more  thinks  of  sensation  than  were  he  splitting 
down  a  block  into  pieces  of  firewood.  With  him 
it  comes  at  length  to  be  an  act  in  every  way  as 
cold-blooded  and  mechanical,  as  that  of  the  man 
who  puts  forth  all  his  strength  and  skill  upon 
inanimate  substances.  And  so  it  is  with  the  men  of 
this,  as  it  is  with  the  men  of  every  other  calling. 
They  take  a  very  keen  interest  in  any  thing  that 
relates  to  their  trade.  And  when  they  meet 
.ogether,  even  though  with  their  wives  and  families, 
heir  whole  talk  is  about  their  trade.  And  should 
any  one  of  them  be  so  far  overtaken  with  the  infir¬ 
mities  of  nature,  as  to  be  laid  up  from  the  business 
of  his  vocation,  still  will  he  keep  alive  in  his  heart 
a  most  affectionate  remembrance  of  the  trade. 
And  this  is  the  true  rationale  of  a  story,  that  we 
know  to  be  authentic,  but  which  is  just  a  story  of 
that  kind  that  one  knows  not  whether  to  laugh  or 
to  crv  at  the  recital  of  it.  A  certain  senior  of  this 
profession,  after  having  realized  a  handsome  com¬ 
petency,  withdrew  from  the  labours  of  it.  He 
had  by  this  time  fully  entered  on  Shakspeare’s 
sixth  age  in  the  drama  of  life,  when  man  descends 
into  the  lean  and  slippered  pantaloon — and  thought 


264  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EAIOT 

himself  now  fuliv  entitled  to  a  perfect  immunity 
from  all  sorts  of  anxiety  and  fatigue,  during  the 
remainder  of  his  days.  Even  he  however  at  length 
felt,  as  other  men  of  business  do,  the  irksomeness 
of  total  vacanc}'' — and  was  accordingly  visited  with 
a  strong  hankering  after  his  wonted  occupation. 
A  neighbour  meeting  liim  one  day  remarked,  that 
he  understood  him  to  have  now  retired  from  busi¬ 
ness — and  as  our  pursuit  is  after  the  genuine 
exhibition  of  human  nature — we  must  give  his 
answer  in  all  its  native  and  characteristic  freshness. 
He  said — that  he  had  retired,  excepting  that  now 
and  then  “  he  just  sticket  a  lamb  for  his  diver¬ 
sion.” 

36.  The  amusement  of  such  a  story  flows  from 
a  principle,  by  the  help  of  which  we  shall  now 
complete  all  the  explanation  which  we  have  to 
offer  upon  this  subject.  We  feel  quite  sure  that 
the  act  now  quoted  would  be  no  diversion  to  any 
of  our  readers ;  but  that  each  and  all  of  them 
would  personally  recoil  from  it  with  the  utmost 
horror.  What  then  is  it  that  hath  ministered  to 
their  diversion  at  the  moment  of  perusal  ?  How 
comes  the  narrative  of  a  thing  to  entertain — when 
the  thing  itself,  and  more  especially  M  ere  it  pro¬ 
posed  that  M  e  should  be  the  agents  in  this  deed  of 
violence,  M  ould  be  utter  abomination  to  us.  What 
incongruity  is  it  that  is  in  our  mind’s  eye,  M’hen 
we  thus  come  under  the  poM'er  of  the  ludicrous 
emotion?  The  poor  and  innocent  suflerer  Me 
scarcely  if  at  all  so  much  as  think  of — and  it  is  not 
in  this  quarter  «’here  the  incongruity  lies,  it  lies 
altogether  in  the  very  odd  exhioition  of  fiuman 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  265 


character,  that  is  ffiven  forth  upon  the  occasion. 
Our  attention  does  not  rest  upon  the  victim,  but 
wholly  upon  the  executioner — and  as  much  of  the 
ludicrous  consists  in  the  want  of  keeping  between 
one  object  and  another,  or  betw'een  the  several 
parts  and  features  of  the  same  object — it  is  really 
at  present  in  the  want  of  keeping,  between  the 
decent  circumstances  and  hospitalities  and  neigh¬ 
bour-like  manners  of  our  aged  acquaintance  on 
the  one  hand,  and  the  kind  of  savage  evolution 
that  he  makes  of  himself  in  this  instance  upon  the 
other — or  rather  perhaps  between  the  horrid  and 
revolting  thing  which  he  said,  and  the  perfect 
unconsciousness  of  the  man  that  there  was  any 
thing  at  all  horrid  or  revolting  about  it — or,  wliat 
might  aggravate  still  more  our  sense  of  the  ridi¬ 
culous,  between  the  shudder  of  painful  emotion 
that  he  inflicted  upon  his  hearers,  and  his  own 
thorough  freedom  from  all  emotion  upon  the  sub¬ 
ject.  Certain  it  is,  at  all  events— that  the  zest  of 
this  story  lies  not  in  any  savage  satisfaction  felt  by 
the  hearers,  from  their  attention  being  directed  to 

a  spectacle  of  agony  in  one  of  another  species _ 

but  it  lies  in  the  light  and  ludicrous  emotion  wliich 
is  awakened,  from  the  attention  being  directed  to 
a  most  incongruous  exhibition  of  phases  on  the 
aspect  and  character  of  one  of  our  own  species. 

37.  And  here  it  is,  that  we  come  in  sight  of 
what  we  have  long  regarded,  as  one  of  those  most 
powerful  and  pernicious  influences,  that  operate 
so  mischievously  in  the  education  of  a  finished 
reprobate.  The  direct  atrocity  from  w'hich  he 
iumseif  would  shrink  at  the  outset  of  his  career, 
voi .  V.  M 


266  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

is  practised  without  a  sigh  by  some  hardier  and 
more  advanced  disciple  in  the  school  of  wickedness. 
It  is  from  him  in  the  first  instance  that  the  lesson 
is  learned  and  practised.  It  is  through  a  liking 
and  an  admiration  of  him  that  the  yet  trembling  and 
unconfirmed  noviciate  is  brought  into  contact  with 
all  the  enormities  of  guilt.  Did  theft  or  impurity 
or  murder  glare  upon  him  at  once  in  all  their 
direct  horrors  or  deformity,  they  might  have  re¬ 
pelled  his  first  approximation,  and  kept  him  at  a 
still  wider  and  more  resolute  distance  from  vice 
than  before.  But,  instead  of  this,  they  are  soften¬ 
ed  as  it  were  by  reflection  from  the  character  of 
one  who  is  fully  initiated;  and  with  the  very 
excesses  of  whose  depravity  there  are  blended 
something  to  admire,  and  something  even  which 
ministers  to  the  gratification  of  a  ludicrous  propen¬ 
sity.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  kind  of 
homage  which  is  rendered  to  intrepidity  in  war,  is 
also  rendered  among  the  outlaws  and  desperadoes 
of  every  community  to  audacity  and  crime — that 
he  who  hath  cast  farthest  away  from  him  the 
scruples  of  conscience,  is  signalized  among  his 
fellows  in  the  very  manner  that  he  is  who  hath 
cast  away  from  him  the  scruples  of  cowardice — • 
that  he  who  hath  got  the  better  of  his  feelings,  is 
regarded  in  somewhat  a  kindred  light  with  him 
who  hath  got  the  better  of  his  fears — that  sensi¬ 
bility,  whether  to  feeling  or  to  principle,  is  put  to 
scorn  amongst  them  as  a  sort  of  unmanly  squeam¬ 
ishness.  There  is,  we  have  often  thonght,  a  deal 
of  instruction  to  be  gathered,  as  to  the  marveis 
and  the  mysteries  of  our  nature,  evon  from  the 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  267 

low  slan£f  of  blackguardism — and  we  can  there 
observe,  that  the  very  epithet  of  chicken-hearted, 
which  is  applied  to  tiiose  who  are  subject  to  the 
tremors  of  cowardice,  is  also  applied  to  those  wko 
are  subject  to  the  relentings  of  humanity.  To 
school  these  down  then,  is  an  achievement,  if 
we  may  so  term  it,  of  moral  strength,  that  gives  a 
certain  air  of  romance  and  even  sublimity  to  those 
outcasts  of  the  species — and  hath  most  assuredly 
thrown  over  the  choice  spirits  of  the  highway,  a 
certain  dash  and  character  of  heroism.  This  is 
seducing  enough  to  a  juvenile  imagination.  But 
the  influence  of  which  we  at  present  speak,  and 
which  we  think  has  not  been  much  adverted  to,  is 
more  particularly  addrest  to  our  taste  for  the 
ludicrous ;  and  that,  not  as  directly  exhibited  in 
the  crime,  but  as  reflected  from  the  oddities  and 
incongruities  which  shine  forth  in  the  aspect  of 
the  criminal.  The  lamb  under  process  of  slaugh¬ 
ter  could  give  no  entertainment  to  any.  But  the 
trait  that  we  have  just  now  recorded  of  its  execu¬ 
tioner,  and  of  his  perfect  sang  froid  in  a  matter 
that  was  so  fitted  to  disturb  and  agitate  ourselves, 
forces  a  smile  into  many  a  countenance.  The 
truth  is  that  to  be  suddenly  presented  wuth  one 
state  of  feeling,  in  circurnsLances  when  we  expected 
another — to  see  a  man  come  forth  with  an  emotion, 
that  IS  at  utter  antipodes  to  the  object  w'hich 
has  excited  it— to  behold  him,  for  example,  in  a 
condition  of  great  fearfulness  where  there  is  nothing 
that  ought  to  alarm  ;  and  (»a  the  other  hand  to 
behold  him  in  a  condition  oi:  great  recklessness, 
when  there  is  something  that  ought  to  arrest  or 


268  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS, 

solemnize — these  are  aii  so  many  incongruities 
which  come  within  the  definition  ot  the  ludicrous — 
and  are  fitted,  in  the  absence  or  feebleness  of 
every  counteracting  emotion,  to  awaken  the  mirth 
of  the  observer.  We  might  give  an  illustration  oi 
this  from  the  narratives  of  pugilism.  There  are 
few  who  would  not  be  shocked  and  sickened  to 
the  uttermost,  by  the  spectacle  of  the  combatants 
after  the  fight  is  ended.  There  is  nought  of  the 
ludicrous  in  their  state  or  appearance,  that  could 
at  all  overbear  the  unmixt  horror,  wherewith  we 
should  look  at  the  blood,  and  the  swoon,  and  the 
shivers,  and  the  seeming  lifelessness,  and  the 
ghastliness,  and  all  the  other  vestiges  of  that 
recent  butchery  which  had  been  practised  upon 
two  human  faces.  Of  the  two  ingredients  that 
we  have  spoken  of,  the  awkwardness  and  the 
severity,  it  would  be  the  latter  that  should  give  to 
our  hearts  their  predominating  emotion.  But  it 
is  not  so  with  the  children  of  the  fancy — who  have 
raised  pugilism  into  a  science — and  with  whom  it 
has  become  almost  a  sort  'of  intellectual  treat  to 
be  the  eye-witnesses,  if  not  the  parties,  in  this 
scene  of  bai'barity.  Now,  in  looking  to  them, 
our  attention  is  turned  diversely  from  that  way 
by  which  we  look  to  the  battle  itself,  or  to  the 
champions  who  are  engaged  in  it.  There  might 
be  nought  of  that  incongruity  about  the  direct 
exhibition  itself  which  could  provoke  us  to  laugh, 
in  the  face  of  so  much  to  distress  the  tenderness 
of  our  nature — but  there  are  many  who  cannot 
help  smiling  at  the  indirect  exhibition  made  by 
the  amateurs — at  the  perfect  sang  /raid  or  rather 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS;.  269 

philosophy  wherewith  they  eye  the  whole  process, 
and  positively  hang  upon  it  as  we  should  do  on 
the  steps  of  a  mathematical  demonstration.  Even 
in  spite  of  all  our  recoil  and  moral  antipathy,  to 
the  character  that  is  thus  given  forth  by  those 
disciples,  of  what  at  best  is  but  a  tolerated  and 
genteel  species  of  blackguardism;  but  even  in 
spite  of  this,  one  feels  a  very  strong  provocative  to 
mirth  when  he  looks  to  their  misplaced  gaiety,  and 
reads  their  very  odd  nomenclature,  and  follows 
out  the  way  in  which  they  embellish  and  set  forth 
their  description  of  the  contest — ransacking  the 
whole  of  nature  for  imagery  by  which  they  might 
garnish  as  it  were,  and  so  overlay  the  native 
horrors  of  the  spectacle.  In  reading  a  pugilistical 
narrative,  when  it  is  rendered  in  the  terms  or  in 
the  technology  of  amateurship — one  feels  a  sort 
of  ambiguous  play  within  him,  between  his  indig¬ 
nation  at  the  cruelty,  and  his  perpetual  tendency 
to  that  sort  of  mirth  which  is  excited  by  an 
amusing  cross  purpose — and  we  can  easily  under¬ 
stand  how  in  the  society  of  these  joyous  and 
festive  and  utterly  regardless  spirits,  one  may 
easily  be  brought  forward  from  laughing  at  them, 
to  laughing  along  tvith  them — to  being  foremost  in 
the  ring,  and  the  most  delighted  with  those  savage 
sports  which  now  they  utterly  execrate.  It  is 
thus  that  we  have  ever  regarded  the  ludicrous 
propensity,  as  a  most  formidable  engine  of  corrup¬ 
tion.  It  operates  most  palpably  in  the  instances 
that  we  have  now  specified — and  we  doubt  not 
that  it  speeds  tne  career  of  many  an  unfortunate 
youth  in  a  stiii  biacker  and  more  abandoned  pro- 


270  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  'fO  'JHE  EMOTIONS. 

fllgacy — that  it  mingles  a  sort  of  agreeable  zest 
with  schemes  of  depredation,  and  even  with  deeds 
of  atrocious  violence — that  the  loud  laugh  of  his 
companionship,  is  readily  awarded  to  the  captain 
of  many  a  murderous  band,  who  outdares  or  out¬ 
does  all  his  fellows  in  iniquity — and  thus  it  is, 
that  we  regard  this  apparently  innocent  and  un¬ 
designing  emotion,  when  unchecked  by  moral 
principle,  as  one  among  others  of  mighty  influence 
in  hastening  forward  the  character  of  man,  to  that 
state  when  the  measure  of  its  depravity  is  full. 

38.  The  especial  lessons  that  flow  out  of  this 
subject,  are,  never  to  make  sport  of  those  incon¬ 
gruities  which  are  associated  with  human  suffering, 
and  never  to  make  sport  of  those  incongruities 
which  are  associated  with  human  worthlessness. 
A  moral  regard  for  the  happiness  of  others,  and  a 
moral  regard  for  virtue  in  general,  should  lay  an 
instantaneous  check  on  the  rising  levity  of  our 
spirits  ;  and  never  are  we  more  led  into  gloomy  and 
despairing  thoughts  of  the  species,  than  when  bar¬ 
barity  and  gaiety  are  blended  together  into  one 
most  frightful  combination.  Among  all  the  exhi¬ 
bitions  that  are  given  forth  by  our  nature,  there 
is  nought  so  diabolical  as  this.  The  earth  we 
occupy  would  become  a  Pandemonium,  were  it  not 
for  the  counteraction  of  other  influences  ;  or,  what 
would  be  a  sovereign  remedy  for  this  and  all  the 
other  excesses  to  which  humanity  is  liable,  were  it 
not  for  conscience  assuming  its  own  legitimate 
oflBce  of  a  regulator,  and  maintaining  the  ascend¬ 
ancy  which  of  right  belongs  to  it  over  all  the 
sensibilities  of  our  nature.  In  the  Maroon  war, 


DNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  271 

when  a  Creole  was  decoyed  from  the  wood  by  a 
man  of  straw,  to  whom  he  stepped  forward  with  a 
view  to  take  aim  against  him,  and  the  real  soldier 

from  his  ambush  shot  him  dead  upon  the  spot _ 

there  is  nought  so  revolting  in  the  death,  as  in  the 
laugh  of  triumph  and  delight  that  came  from  the 
party  in  the  enjoyment  of  their  own  dexterity. 
Upon  one  occasion  when  the  French,  who  had  the 
most  demoralised  soldiery  in  Europe,  filled  an 
hospital  with  their  wounded  men — it  was  not  half 
so  horrifying  to  see  one  of  them  in  his  last  agonies, 
as  to  see  another  looking  on,  amusing  himself  with 
the  mimicry  of  grimace  and  of  gesture,  as  he  copied 
all  the  tremulous  variations  that  played  upon  the 
countenance  of  the  dying  man.  When  some  stu¬ 
dents  of  a  distant  university,  dunned  and  pestered 
by  the  applications  of  a  tailor  to  whom  they  were 
indebted,  at  length  got  rid  of  him  by  cutting  off 
his  ears — this  trait  of  atrocious  character,  appalling 
as  it  is,  is  not  nearly  so  appalling  as  was  the  glee 
of  a  polite  and  civilized  company,  when  it  was  told 
as  a  merry  adventure,  and  that  the  man  never 
came  back  to  claim  his  ears  again.  Such  fell  and 
fiendish  exhibitions  may  well  convince  us,  what 
would  become  of  human  society,  if  man  had  nought 
but  emotions  and  impulses  to  urge  his  fluctuating 
path — or  if  he  were  left  without  a  presiding  helm 
in  the  midst  of  all  this  waywardness — if  his  only 
guide  were  a  pathology  that  wielded  its  unresisted 
energies  over  him — or  rather  if,  without  guidance 
altogether,  he  resigned  himself  a  prostrate  and  a 
willing  subject  to  its  power.  Even  still,  might 
humanity  and  honour  shoot  forth  an  occasional 


272  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

gleam  in  this  wild  medley  of  ,the  emotions ;  but, 
without  a  superior  power  that  might  take  a  direct¬ 
ing  charge  over  them  all,  never  will  man  attain  to 
true  worth  or  endurance  of  character — and  never 
will  the  earth  that  he  treads  upon  cease  to  groan 
under  the  burden  of  its  moral  abominations. 

39.  This  whole  subject  admits  of  many  grave, 
and  moral,  and  even  theological  applications. 

40.  We  have  already  adverted  to  the  difficulty 
which  is  attendant  upon  every  effort  to  know  our 
internal  processes.  It  is  most  natural  for  the 
mind  just  to  look  after  them  in  order  that  she  may 
know  them,  or  in  other  words  to  look  with  reflex 
eye  towards  herself,  and  so  endeavour  to  observe 
wdiat  is  going  on  there.  Now,  in  most  cases,  it  is 
by  the  attention  of  the  mind  to  an  outward  object, 
that  the  inward  process  is  both  set  agoing  and 
kept  agoing ;  and  when  the  mind  ceases  this  at¬ 
tention,  which  it  does  at  the  moment  of  withdraw¬ 
ing  itself  from  the  object  to  the  subject,  the  pro¬ 
cess  which  it  hath  turned  about  to  examine  at  that 
moment  terminates.  It  is  so  with  every  emotion 
that  hath  an  external  cause,  as  in  the  example  of 
anger.  When  we  cast  the  mental  eye  tow  ards  the 
anger,  we  withdraw  it  from  that  by  which  alone 
the  anger  is  sustained ;  and  this  affection  vanishes 
from  the  heart,  on  the  instant  that  we  propose  to 
seize  upon  it. 

41.  And  so,  after  all,  it  is  by  a  busy  interchange 
between  the  mind  and  the  world  which  is  without, 
that  the  world  which  is  within  is  evolved  into  a 
state  of  manifestation.  The  impressions  which 


UXIJUK  PLACE  GIVEN  'I'O  THE  EMOTIONS.  273 

outward  things  make  upon  the  mind  through  the 
avenue  of  the  senses  are  cne  hist  or  the  raw  mate¬ 
rials  of  all  mental  philosophy.  Ere  we  can  become 
acquainted  then  with  that  which  passes  inwardly, 
we  must  have  looked  outwardly ;  and,  for  man  to 
know  his  own  internal  processes,  there  must  have 
been  a  busy  converse  on  his  part  with  the  objects 
that  are  placed  around  him. 

42.  Now  what  is  true  with  regard  to  the  method 
by  which  we  become  acquainted  with  our  internal 
processes,  is  equally  true  in  regard  to  the  method 
by  which  we  regulate  these  processes.  If  to 
know  our  own  heart  it  be  indispensable  that  we 
look  outwardly,  then  to  keep  or  to  control  our 
own  heart  it  is  alike  indispensable  that  we  look 
outwardly.  There  is  an  analogy  between  the 
observation  that  we  have  already  made  on  the 
business  of  self-knowledge,  and  the  observation 
that  we  now  make  on  the  business  of  self-govern¬ 
ment  ;  and  whatever  importance  may  belong  to 
the  one  in  the  philosophy  of  mind,  an  equal  im¬ 
portance  belongs  to  the  other  in  the  philosophy 
and  more  especially  the  practice  of  morals. 

43.  When  a  man  is  bidden  to  know  his  own 
heart,  it  is  most  natural  for  him  to  turn  about  that 
he  may  gaze  upon  it.  In  so  doing,  he  hath  dark¬ 
ened  the  whole  field  of  contemplation,  just  as  if 
by  the  movement  that  he  hath  made,  he  had 
thrown  his  own  shadow  upon  it,  by  intercepting 
all  the  light  that  else  would  have  been  poured 
from  without  on  the  penetralia  of  his  bosom.  And, 
in  like  manner,  when  he  is  told  to  keep  or  to 
cultivate  his  heart,  it  is  most  natural  for  him  to 


274  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

try  an  operation  of  some  sort  on  the  springs  of  his 
inner  mechanism.  There  is  perhaps  a  sort  of 
undirected  effort  towards  that  which  is  within ; 
but  at  every  repetition  he  finds  it  to  be  fruitless 
and  unavailing — a  conatus  that  can  find  no  distinct 
object  to  rest  upon — a  kind  of  aimless  or  general 
plunge  into  himself,  that  still  leaves  the  citadel  of 
the  heart  untouched  and  unentered  upon.  The 
truth  is  that  most  of  the  emotions  of  the  heart, 
are  the  responses  which  it  gives  forth  to  objects 
that  are  at  a  distance  and  separate  from  itself — 
and  the  only  way  of  calling  out  these  responses,  is 
by  keeping  an  open  avenue  between  the  heart  and 
these  objects.  This  is  done  by  the  attention — 
and  therefore  it  is  that  we  should  regard  this 
faculty  as  a  most  important  engine  of  moral  dis¬ 
cipline. 

44.  For  the  purpose  of  accomplishing  the  pre¬ 
cept — “  Know  thine  own  heart” — w^e  recommend 
a  busy  observation  of  it  at  the  moment  of  inter¬ 
course  between  it  and  the  outer  world;  or,  in 
other  words,  we  should  go  forth  on  the  objects 
around  us,  ere  we  can  have  materials  for  the  study 
or  the  science  of  that  nature  which  is  within  us. 
Now  there  is  a  direction  the  counterpart  of  this 
for  the  purpose  of  accomplishing  the  other  precept 
— “  Keep  thine  own  heart.”  The  faculty  of  atten¬ 
tion,  when  employed  on  external  things,  is  just  as 
mighty  an  instrument  of  moral  discipline  as  it  is 
of  mental  discovery.  It  fetches  that  influence 
from  \\ithout,  which  bears  with  efficacy  on  the 
springs  of  feeling  and  of  action;  and  as  the  one 
recommendation  may  have  set  us  on  the  right 


UNDUC  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  275 

way  of  going  about  the  study  of  our  moral  nature; 
so  the  other,  of  higher  importance  still,  may  set 
us  on  the  right  way  by  which  to  go  about  the 
cultivation  of  it. 

45.  'Fhe  most  distinct  of  ail  moral  propositions 
is_“  that  we  should  not  wish  for  another,  what 
we  should  not  wish  for  ourselves  were  we  in  his 
circumstances.”  It  is  a  proposition  which  recom¬ 
mends  itself,  and  hath  an  immediate  hold  upon 
the  conscience  at  the  moment  of  its  being  uttered. 
It  finds  a  ready  echo  in  every  bosom;  and,  to 
demonstrate  the  universal  consent  wherewith  it 
passes  current  in  society,  we  may  recollect  the 
many  familiar  occasions,  on  M'hich  unlettered 
peasants,  or  even  children,  have  remonstrated  with 
another  who  was  doing  a  hard  or  injurious  thing 
to  one  of  his  fellow-men — “  How  would  you  like 
another  to  treat  you  in  that  manner  ?”  So  that 
here  is  the  example  of  at  least  one  moral  principle 
acknowledged  by  all,  felt  by  ourselves,  and  which 
can  be  turned  into  serviceable  application  in  every 
one  act  of  human  intercourse.  Now  with  this  in 
our  mind,  and  there  in  such  force  too  as  to  give 
direction  to  the  will,  it  is  quite  palpable  what  the 
part  is  which  our  attention  will  select,  out  of  all 
the  other  parts  of  any  compound  exhibition,  as  the 
object  that  it  seizes  upon  and  on  which  it  shall 
dwell.  In  the  case  of  that  compound  exhibition 
which  is  offered  by  a  sentient  creature  in  distress, 
we  wdll  send  forth  our  thoughts  upon  that  which 
we  should  most  dislike  ourselves  in  the  situation 
that  he  occupies— or,  in  other  words,  we  will  be 
engrossed  with  the  consideration  of  his  pain — and, 


276  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

e^  ell  though  blended  as  it  sometimes  is  with  th^ 
ridiculous,  we  will  be  otherwise  employed  than  in 
looking  towards  that  which  might  else  have  pro¬ 
voked  our  merriment.  The  very  exercise,  by 
which  it  is  that  we  enter  into  the  state  and  conse¬ 
quent  feeling  of  the  sufterer,  will,  of  itself,  suggest 
how  much  the  unpleasantness  of  his  sensations 
would  be  aggravated  by  a  loud  laugh  from  the 
spectators — and  this,  of  itself,  would  operate  as  a 
check  upon  our  levity.  It  is  thus  that  what  others 
looked  upon  with  enjoyment,  we  should  look  upon 
with  sympathy  and  with  seriousness.  Our  heart 
would  be  wholly  under  a  different  affection  from 
theirs.  It  would  be  in  a  better  state ;  and,  were 
the  cause  of  this  demanded,  it  might  be  said  that 
it  is  because  of  the  better  keeping  or  the  better 
cultivation  of  it.  Still  however  we  maintain,  that 
a  main  implement  in  the  work  of  this  cultivation, 
is  an  outward  object,  which  hath  sent  the  right 
and  appropriate  emotion  into  that  secret  chamber, 
where  the  sensibilities  of  the  inner  man  have  their 
play.  The  mecliauisni  there  is  operating  rightly, 
but  it  is  in  virtue  of  a  touch  from  without.  It  is 
by  looking  outwardly  and  not  inwardly,  in  fact, 
that  the  mind  hath  been  set  as  it  were  to  the  right 
object,  whose  moving  influence  it  is  that  brings 
the  mind  into  its  right  state  of  emotion  ;  and  thus 
the  cultivation  of  the  dispositions  is  manifested  to 
be  a  more  simple  and  intelligible  process,  than 
many  are  in  the  habit  of  conceiving  it. 

46.  In  this  business  of  cultivating  the  heart, 
it  is  often  as  much  an  object  to  expel  from  it 
a  wrong  affection  as  to  bring  it  under  the  power 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  277 

of  a  right  one.  Of  what  importance  then  is  it 
that  we  should  know  the  way  of  going  about  it— • 
that  we  should  know,  for  example,  how  best  to 
school  and  to  keep  in  check  the  emotion  of  anger, 
which,  if  given  way  to,  might  terminate  in  some 
deed  or  expression  of  violence  that  may  after¬ 
wards  cause  both  uneasiness  and  remorse.  The 
very  prospect  of  this  is  a  powerful  restraint  upon 
us — and  we  cannot  fail  to  perceive  that,  when 
engaged  with  this  prospect,  the  mind  is  for  the 
time  away  from  the  provocation  that  might  other¬ 
wise  have  hurried  it  into  some  act  of  lamentable 
temerity.  But  there  are  other  and  some  of  them 
more  generous  expedients — in  all  of  which,  how¬ 
ever  the  operation  of  that  great  principle  may  be 
detected,  by  which  it  is  that  an  emotion  dies  away 
from  the  heart,  the  moment  that  the  attention  of  the 
mind  is  withdrawn  from  the  object  which  awakened 
it — and  we  thus  see,  how  the  very  cause  which,  in 
some  of  its  departments,  is  an  impediment  to  our 
progress  in  the  philosophy  of  morals,  is  an  auxili¬ 
ary  in  the  practice  of  morals.  That  which  retards 
our  proficiency  in  it  when  regarded  as  a  science — 
is  the  very  thing  that  aids  our  proficiency  in  it 
when  regarded  as  an  art.  If  we  want  to  study 
anger,  we  lose  sight  of  it  in  the  act  of  turning  our 
mental  eye  away  from  its  object — and  therefore 
it  we  want  to  shun  anger,  we  have  nothing  else  to 
do.  but  just  to  make  our  escape  from  it  by  pre¬ 
cisely  the  same  expedient.  It  is  in  fact  what  the 
mind  insensibly  does,  when  anxious,  under  some 
sore  injury,  or  under  some  vexatious  or  troublesome 
annoyance,  to  keep  itself  calm.  It  will  not  face 


278  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

the  provocation  lest  it  give  way ;  but  tries  in  every 
possible  manner  to  stifle  the  thought  of  it.  It 
sometimes  even  has  recourse  to  some  formal  and 
direct  efforts  for  this  purpose.  We  forget  what 
man  of  celebrity  it  was,  who,  on  the  first  visitation 
of  anger,  repeated  the  words  of  the  Lord’s  Prayer 
— or  what  eminent  judge  in  our  own  land,  that,  on 
similar  occasions,  read  a  particular  chapter  in  the 
New  Testament.  There  is  no  doubt  that  the 
topics  suggested  by  either  of  these  exercises,  might 
create  an  etfectual  diversion  of  the  mind  from  that 
which  would  have  fed  and  fostered  within  it  the 
rising  emotion — but  ^there  is  even  a  diversion 
created  by  the  very  exercise  itself.  Any  thing 
that  wall  take  away  the  mind  from  the  object  of 
its  emotion,  takes  the  emotion  away  from  the 
mind — and  when  it  ceases  to  brood  on  the  provo¬ 
cation,  the  provocation  ceases  to  be  felt.  And  by 
far  the  greatest  triumph  which  a  man  can  achieve 
over  his  own  spirit,  when  like  to  be  hurried  away 
into  the  transports  of  resentment — is,  when,  instead 
of  shifting  aw^ay  his  regards  from  him  whose  injustice 
is  the  object  of  it,  he  can  fix  on  a  something  else 
in  his  condition  or  in  his  character  that  might 
mitigate  and  appease  it — when  he  can  call  to  mind, 
perhaps,  the  kindness  that  in  other  days  he  re¬ 
ceived  from  the  hand  of  him  that  now  hath  unac¬ 
countably  wronged  him — when  he  can  dwell  on 
the  benefits  conferred  at  a  season  of  former  friend¬ 
ship  on  himself  and  on  his  family  ;  and,  in  the  utter 
defect  of  all  such  palliatives,  w  hen  he  can  w  ithdraw 
his  mind  from  that  injustice  which  is  the  object  of 
irritation,  i-o  that  frailty  of  our  mortal  and  erring 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOIIONS  279 

nature  which  might  be  the  object  of  deepest  and 
tenderest  sympathy.  It  is  thus  that  with  some 
men  of  a  very  lofty  cast  of  reflection,  the  resent¬ 
ment  they  else  would  have  against  another,  is 
drowned  in  their  feelings  of  commiseration  and 
seriousness.  They  can  look  beyond  the  injustice 
of  the  passing  hour;  and,  instead  of  a  burning 
indignation  against  him  who  now  triumphs  in  the 
success  of  his  unprincipled  dexterity,  they  could 
even  weep  in  tenderness  over  him,  as  they  think 
of  his  coming  death  his  coming  judgment  and  his 
coming  eternity. 

47.  In  this  instance  of  the  cultivation  of  the 
heart,  a  good  result  Is  arrived  at,  merely  by  the 
converse  which  the  mind  has  with  things  out  of 
itself  and  separate  from  itself.  It  is  by  the  atten¬ 
tion  shifting  its  objects,  that  the  heart  shifteth  its 
emotions.  It  exchanges  wrath  for  compassion, 
by  withdrawing  itself  from  that  which  excited  the 
wrath  to  that  which  now  excites  the  compassion. 
We  very  generally  find  among  our  practical 
writers,  that,  when  reasons  and  motives  and  various 
considerations  are  urged  against  one  particular 
aflection  and  in  favour  of  another,  they  are  such 
as  supply  the  mind  with  an  object  different  from 
that  by  which  it  has  been  seduced  into  a  wrong 
feeling,  and  directly  fitted  to  awaken  a  right  one. 
They  in  fact  recognise  the  doctrine  that  we  have 
all  along  been  insisting  on.  And  as  we  have 
already  explained  how  much  it  is  that  we  must 
look  outwardly,  in  order  to  study  the  heart — so  it 
is  of  importance  to  understand,  how  much  it  is  that 
we  must  look  outwardly,  ui  order  to  cultivate  it. 


i'80  UNDUK  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

48.  To  keep  alive  the  emotion  of  gratitude  in 
the  heart,  we  must  keep  the  kindness  of  him  who 
is  the  object  of  it  in  our  frequent  and  habitual 
remembrance.  This  is  another  example  of  an 
emotion  helped  by  an  object — of  an  influence 
fetched  from  without,  for  the  purpose  of  originat¬ 
ing  and  sustaining  a  right  sensibility  within — in 
other  words,  of  the  cultivation  of  the  inner  man 
lieing  carried  forward,  by  means  of  the  attention 
going  forth  on  certain  objects,  which  have  their 
standing  place  in  the  outer  world.  That  this  is 
not  a  vain  and  metaphysical  speculation,  is  evident 
even  from  the  talk  and  the  conceptions  of  an  un¬ 
lettered  peasantry.  They  see,  and  very  intelli¬ 
gently  too,  where  it  is  that  the  criminality  of  ingra¬ 
titude  lies  ;  and  their  very  remonstrances  on  the 
subject  prove  also,  that  they  know  how  this  crime 
might  have  been  prevented.  They  know  that  it 
is  the  attention  which  is  in  fault — a  faculty  for  the 
exercise  of  which  we  are  chargeable  with  fault, 
only  because  it  is  subject  to  the  control  of  the 
will.  The  reproachful  questions  which  are  put 
upon  these  occasions,  all  testify  the  truth  of  our 
principle — “  Could  not  you  have  minded  the 
great  benefits  that  he  at  one  time  conferred  upon 
you  ?”  “  How  could  you  have  forgotten  them,  as 

you  must  have  done  at  the  time  when  you  conduct¬ 
ed  yourself  so  ungenerously  and  so  ungraciously 
towards  him?”  “Why  did  you  not  call  to  re¬ 
membrance,  how  much  he  at  one  time  did  both  for 
yourself  and  your  family  ?” — all  conspiring  to  the 
same  result,  that  attention,  wherewith  memory  is 
so  closely  allied,  is  indeed  the  grand  instrument 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  281 

for  the  cultivation  of  the  heart,  and  that,  to  bring 
into  the  heart  the  right  emotions,  we  must  keep 
the  mind  in  contact  with  the  right  objects. 

49.  We  know  not  a  more  beautiful  and  im¬ 
portant  application  of  the  principle,  than  to  the 
business  of  cultivating  purity  of  heart — that  noble 
characteristic,  in  virtue  of  which,  it  would  shrink, 
even  in  unobserved  solitude,  from  the  intrusion  of 
so  much  as  one  unhallowed  thought;  so  that,  should 
a  wrong  or  worthless  imagination  ever  present 
itself,  one  moment  would  not  be  suffered  to  inter¬ 
vene,  ere  the  offensive  visitant  was  bidden  authori¬ 
tatively  away  from  the  recesses  of  that  yet  un¬ 
vitiated  sacredness  which  it  had  offered  to  violate, 
’^t  is  true  that  the  ludicrous  and  the  indelicate 
.  have  here  entered  into  one  most  formidable  asso¬ 
ciation  ;  and  that,  in  no  department  of  human 
morality,  has  the  former  otion  more  exemplified 
its  power  of  mischief,  upon  the  character  and 
habits  of  the  rising  genei’ation.  There  are  thou¬ 
sands,  and  tens  of  thousands,  who  can  trace  to 
this,  the  first  beginnings  of  a  corruption,  which  has 
lured  them  to  the  paths  of  the  destroyer ;  and  it 
is  because  of  this,  that,  even  apart  from  the  mis¬ 
deeds  and  the  outward  profligacies  of  a  ruinous 
dissipation,  there  has  with  thousands  more,  been 
an  utter  desecration  of  the  inner  man,  because 
robbed  of  all  the  honourable  and  high-minded 
delicacies  which  adorned  it.  It  is  indeed  the 
proudest  of  achievements,  to  be  the  instrument  .of 
determining  so  much  as  one  youthful  bosom,  in  the 
vigorous  defence  of  itself  against  this  foulcontamina- 
tion;  and  that,  not  alone  for  the  sake  of  adding  one 


282  UNDUK  PLACE  GIVEN  I’O  THE  EAJOTIONS. 

to  the  list  of  other  virtues,  or  of  protecting  from  the 
inroads  of  one  solitary  vice — but  for  the  sake  of 

V 

shielding  the  whole  moral  temperament  from  the 
sore  blight  of  one  wasting  and  universal  desola¬ 
tion.  It  is  not  true,  that  we  can  surrender  one 
point  or  principle  of  moral  character,  and  leave 
all  its  other  virtues  and  accomplishments  entire. 
This  is  one  surrender,  by  which  a  shock  is  given 
to  the  whole  strength  and  structure  of  the  moral 
system ;  and,  instead  of  fighting  for  the  preserva¬ 
tion  of  an  outpost,  which,  even  though  given  up, 
leaves  us  in  almost  entire  possession  of  the  whole 
moral  territory — this  is  a  battle,  on  the  issue  of 
which  there  hang  all  the  cherished  decencies  of 
social  and  domestic  life  in  this  world,  and  the 
success  of  all  our  preparations  for  the  eternity 
that  follows  it. 

50.  Now  there  is  not  one  branch  of  moral  pro¬ 
priety,  to  which  the  maxim  is  more  applicable — 
that  he  who  rules  his  life  well,  is  he  who  rules  his 
spirit  well.  And,  where  within  the  whole  compass 
of  human  affairs,  is  there  exemplified  a  more  inti¬ 
mate  connexion  between  the  heart  and  the  history  ? 
— so  that  if  the  one  have  suffered,  the  other  will 
suffer  ;  and  success,  on  the  contrary,  is  certain,  if 
that  heart  be  kept  with  all  diligence  out  of  which 
are  the  issues  of  life.  We  can  be  at  no  loss,  after 
what  has  been  so  repeatedly  insisted  on,  for  the 
best  practical  method  of  cultivation — to  withdraw 
the  thoughts  from  that  object  which  kindles  the 
wrong  affection ;  and  this  is  most  readily  done  by 
the  determined  habit  of  transferring  them  to  other 
objects.  America,  said  Lord  Chatham,  must  be 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  283 

conquered  in  Germany.  With  far  greater  truth 
may  it  be  said  that  the  wayward  tendencies  of  the 
heart  are  conquered,  not  so  much  by  an  operation 
at  home  as  by  an  operation  abroad — by  all  the 
forces  of  thought,  and  attention,  and  perseverance, 
being  carried  in  an  export  direction,  if  we  may  be 
allowed  the  phrase,  to  some  place  in  the  external 
scene  of  contemplation — by  the  flight  of  the  mind 
from  that  which  hath  disturbed  the  calm  of  its 
pure  and  unruffled  tranquillity,  and  a  flight  not 
inwardly  upon  itself,  but  outwardly  upon  some 
other  thing  in  the  prospect  which  is  around  it  than 
that  which  hath  made  a  threatening  inroad  upon 
its  principles.  Of  course,  the  jest  and  the  levity 
of  lawless  companionship  must  be  shunned  and 
shrunk  from  like  the  malignity  of  a  pestilence ; 
and  science,  and  business,  and  innocent  amusement, 
and  all  other  places  of  escape  from  a  hurtful  and 
most  withering  infection,  are  so  many  distinct  re¬ 
sources  in  this  business  of  moral  cultivation.  But 
far  the  most  effectual  refuge  is,  in  the  contempla¬ 
tion  of  that  ethereal  and  unclouded  purity,  by  which 
the  throne  of  heaven  is  encircled — a  lifting  of  the 
thoughts  to  the  august  and  unpolluted  sacredness 
which  dwelleth  there — the  daily  and  diligent  con¬ 
sideration  of  that  awfui  sanctuary  which  is  above, 
where  nought  that  is  unholy  can  enter — and  a 
solemn  invocation  to  Him,  before  the  rebuke  of 
whose  countenance,  all  the  vanities  of  a  distem¬ 
pered  imagination  will  at  once  flee  away. 

51.  Finally,  we  advert  to  the  marvellous  ac- 
cordancy  that  obtains,  between  the  soundest  views 
which  philosophy  has  opened  to  us  of  the  nature 


284  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

of  man,  and  the  doctrine  of  that  book  which  pro¬ 
fesses  to  have  been  dictated  by  Him  who  constructed 
that  nature,  and  must  therefore  be  acquainted  with 
all  its  mysteries.  There  are  two  remarkable  con- 
gruities  of  this  kind,  which  we  would  shortly  notice, 
as  having  met  our  observation  in  the  prosecution 
of  these  remarks  on  the  pathology  of  man.  The 
first  relates  to  the  power  which  the  object  contem¬ 
plated  has  over  the  springs  of  human  character 
and  conduct — the  alliance  that  obtains  between  that 
object  which  is  in  the  eye  of  the  nnderstanding, 
and  that  sensibility  which  is  excited  thereby  within 
the  recesses  of  the  heart ;  or  between  the  way 
in  which  man  is  looking  with  his  mind,  and  the 
way  in  which  he  is  affected  to  love  or  to  piety  or  to 
moral  righteousness.  Now  there  is  nought  which 
is  so  fi-equently  affirmed  in  scripture,  as  the  power 
that  lies  in  the  mere  revelation  of  the  truth,  pro¬ 
vided  that  the  truth  is  believed  and  attended  to — 
the  power  which  lies  in  it  to  revolutionize  the 
whole  character,  and  to  make  a  new  creature  of 
him  who  has  received  it.  The  phraseology  of 
inspiration  is  distinct  from  that  of  the  academy. 
Bnt  if  we  consider,  not  the  terms,  but  the  substaiv 
tial  truths  in  which  it  deals,  we  shall  find,  under 
the  gnise  of  such  expressions  as  “  being  sanctified 
by  faith,’’  as  “  being  born  again  through  the  word 
of  truth,”  as  “  being  renewed  in  knowledge  after 
the  likeness  of  him  that  created  us,”  as  “beholding 
with  open  face”  the  glory  of  a  bright  excellence, 
and  being  transformed  into  that  which  we  admire 
in  the  very  act  of  our  beholding  it — we  shall  find 
in  these  and  a  variety  of  similar  passages,  a  con- 


UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS.  285 

stant  recognition  of  that  very  dependence  between 
the  mind  and  the  heart,  to  the  view  of  which  we 
are  conducted  by  our  own  separate  reasonings  on 
the  pathology  of  human  nature.  And  we  are 
further  led  to  perceive  that  the  faith,  which  so  many 
have  traduced  as  an  inert  and  unproductive  dogma, 
displacing  virtue  from  the  rank  and  pre-eminence 
which  belong  to  it — that  this  faith  is,  in  fact,  the 
great  instrument  of  such  a  moral  renovation,  as 
shall  at  length  give  another  aspect  to  our  world, 
and  unite  the  people  of  every  tongue  and  nation 
and  kindred  who  live  in  it  into  one  common  brother¬ 
hood — one  affectionate  and  rejoicing  family. 

52.  But  there  is  still  another  very  striking 
accordancy,  that,  because  of  its  great  practical 
importance,  we  cannot  forbear  to  notice.  We 
allude  to  the  whole  of  that  morality,  which  relates 
to  the  management  of  those  evil  and  seducing  in¬ 
fluences,  that  pass  under  the  name  of  temptations 

_ such  as  the  temptation  of  corrupt  society — the 

temptation  of  all  those  objects  that  inflame  the 
wrong  propensities  of  our  nature — the  temptation 
of  every  thing  which,  whether  present  to  the  senses 
or  to  the  thoughts,  is  followed  up  by  an  emotion 
that  is  any  way  adverse  to  the  purity  or  recti¬ 
tude  of  the  character  of  man.  It  may  occasionally 
happen,  in  our  passage  through  the  world,  that 
these  temptations  meet  us  on  our  way,  and  can 
only  be  overcome  by  dint  of  a  vigorous  and  deter¬ 
mined  resistance.  But  aware  how  much  easier 
it  is,  when  possible,  to  shun  the  encounter  than  to 
struggle  against  that  pathological  law,  by  which  an 
object  and  an  emotion  stand  so  closely  and  causaliy 


286  UNDUE  PLACE  GIVEN  TO  THE  EMOTIONS. 

related,  the  one  to  the  other — the  uniform  deliver¬ 
ance  of  this  hook  of  wisdom  is,  that,  when  the 
alternative  is  within  our  reach  whether  we  shall 
face  the  temptation  or  shall  flee  it — we  should  take 
to  the  latter  term  of  the  alternative,  as  that  which 
is  most  suited  to  the  real  mediocrity  of  the  human 
powers,  and  the  actual  laws  of  the  human  consti¬ 
tution.  And  accordingly  in  such  clauses,  as  “  enter 
not  into  temptation,”  and  “  lead  us  not  into  tempta¬ 
tion,”  and  “  turn  away  my  sight  and  mine  eyes  from 
viewing  vanity,”  and  “flee  those  evil  aftections 
which  war  against  the  soul” — in  all  these  it  be¬ 
speaks  its  own  just  and  enlightened  discernment 
of  the  mechanism  of  our  nature. 

53.  We  are  the  more  explicit  and  the  more 
earnest  upon  this  subject,  that  to  the  heedlessness 
of  its  principles,  we  would  ascribe  many  a  most 
aflecting  overthrow'.  It  is  indeed,  for  the  young 
and  interesting  hoy,  of  all  transitions  the  most 
distressingly  painful — when,  in  exchange  for  the 
delicacies  w'hich  at  once  adorned  and  guarded  him, 
he  gathers  upon  his  aspect  the  hue  and  the  knowing 
hardihood  of  vice — w  hen  the  graces  of  his  opening 
manhood  are  thus  so  unfeelingly  and  so  cruelly 
scattered  away — and  the  rising  hope  of  his  family, 
whose  presence  wont  to  gladden  liis  family  circle, 
and  the  unsullied  purity  of  whose  habits  fitted  him 
for  the  mild  and  the  innocent  harmonies  of  such  a 
companionship,  when  he  becomes  a  hacknied  prac¬ 
titioner  in  the  arts  of  lowest  and  loathsomest  dissi¬ 
pation.  To  arrest  such  a  melancholy  catastrophe 
as  this,  it  is  necessary  to  be  strong  in  all  the  holv 
determinations  of  principle — to  be  resolute  in  the 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


287 


discipline  of  the  heart  and  of  the  habits — ^bidding 
away  every  unhallowed  image  from  the  chambers  of 
thought,  and  spurning  from  the  presence  or  from 
the  perception  every  object  that  might  form  an 
incitement  to  wickedness. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

On  the  Final  Causes  of  the  Emotions. 

1.  In  our  Natural  Theology,*  we  have  appealed, 
as  evidence  for  a  God,  to  the  affections  of  our 
Nature.  We  now  subjoin  a  few  additional  re¬ 
marks' on  this  subject,  chiefly  with  the  view  of 
demonstrating,  that,  however  little  man  is  to  be 
accredited  for  moral  goodness,  when,  apart  from 
the  consideration  of  duty  he  simply  obeys  these 
affections — yet,  beneficial  as  they  are,  nay  indis¬ 
pensable  to  the  maintenance  of  human  life  and 
human  society,  they  form  most  palpable  and  con¬ 
vincing  arguments  for  the  goodness  of  the  Being 
who  implanted  them. 

2.  The  emotions,  it  must  now  be  obvious,  enter 
largely  into  the  pathological  department  of  our 
nature.  They  are  distinguishable,  as  we  have 
already  intimated,  both  from  the  appetites  and  the 
external  affections,  in  that  they  are  mental  and 
not  bodily — though,  in  common  with  these,  they 
are  characterized  by  a  peculiar  vividness  of  feeang. 


•  Book  IV,  Chaps,  ii,  iii,  and  t 


288  FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 

■which  distinguishes  them  from  the  intellectual 
states  of  the  mind.  It  may  not  be  easy  to  express 
the  difference  in  language ;  but  we  never  confound 
them  in  specific  instances — being  at  no  loss  to 
which  of  the  two  classes  w'e  should  refer  the  acts 
of  memory  and  j  udgment ;  and  to  which  we  should 
refer  the  sentiments  of  fear,  or  gratitude,  or  shame, 
or  any  of  the  numerous  affections  and  desires  of 
which  the  mind  is  susceptible. 

3.  The  first  belonging  to  this  class  that  now 
remains  to  be  noticed  is  the  desire  of  knowledge, 
or  the  principle  of  curiosity — having  all  the  appear¬ 
ance  and  character  of  a  distinct  and  original  ten¬ 
dency  in  the  mind,  implanted  there  for  the  purpose 
to  which  it  is  so  obviously  subservient.  This 
principle  evinces  its  reality  and  strength  in  very 
early  childhood,  even  anterior  to  the  faculty  of 
speech — as  might  be  observed  in  the  busy  mani¬ 
pulations  and  exploring  looks  of  the  little  infant, 
on  any  new  article  that  is  placed  within  its  reach ; 
and  afterwards,  by  its  importunate  and  never- 
ending  questions.  It  is  this  avidity  of  knowledge, 
which  forms  the  great  impellent  to  the  acquisition 
of  it — being  in  fact  the  hunger  of  the  mind,  and 
strikingly  analogous  to  the  corresponding  bodily 
appetite,  in  those  respects  by  which  each  is  mani¬ 
fested  to  be  the  product  of  a  higher  wisdom  than 
ours,  the  effect  of  a  more  providential  care  than 
man  would  have  taken  of  himself.  I'he  corporeal 
appetency  seeks  for  food  as  its  terminating  ob- 
lOCt,  witiiout  regard  to  its  ulterior  effect  in  the 
oustaining  of  life.  The  mental  appetency  seeks 
for  knowledge,  the  food  of  the  mind,  as  its  termi- 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  289 

nating  object,  without  regard  to  its  ulterior  benefits, 
both  in  the  guidance  of  life,  and  the  endless  multi¬ 
plication  of  its  enjoyments.  The  prospective 
wisdom  of  man  could  be  trusted  with  neither  of 
these  great  interests;  and  so  the  urgent  appetite 
of  hunger  had  to  be  provided  for  the  one,  and  the 
like  urgent  principle  of  curiosity  had  to  be  pro¬ 
vided  for  the  other.  Each  of  them  bears  the 
same  evidence  of  a  special  contrivance  for  a  special 
object — and  that  by  one  who  took  a  more  compre¬ 
hensive  view  of  our  welfare,  than  we  are  capable 
of  taking  for  ourselves ;  and  made  his  own  additions 
to  the  mechanism,  for  the  express  purpose  of  sup¬ 
plementing  the  deficiency  of  human  foresight.  The 
resemblance  between  the  two  cases  goes  strikingly 
to  demonstrate,  how  a  mental  constitution  might 
as  effectually  bespeak  the  hand  of  an  intelligent 
IVIaker,  as  does  a  physical  or  material  constitution. 
It  is  true,  that,  with  the  great  majority  of  men, 
the  intellectual  is  not  so  urgent  or  imperious  as  is 
the  animal  craving.  But  even  for  this  difference, 
we  can  perceive  a  reason,  which  would  not  have 
been  found  under  a  random  economy  of  things. 
Each  man’s  hunger  would  need  to  be  alike  strong, 
or  at  least  strong  enough  to  ensure  the  taking  of 
food  for  himself— for  to  this  effect,  he  will  receive 
no  benefit  from  another  man’s  hunger.  But  there 
is  not  the  same  reason  why  each  man’s  curiosity 
should  be  alike  strong — for  the  curiosity  of  one 
man  might  subserve  the  supply  of  information  and 
intellectual  food  to  the  rest  of  the  species.  To 
enlarge  the  knowledge  of  the  world,  it  is  not 
needed  that  all  men  should  be  endowed  with  such 

VOL.  V. 


N 


290  FINAL  CAL'SKS  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 

a  Strength  of  desire  for  it,  as  to  bear  them  onward 
through  the  toils  of  original  investigation.  The 
dominant,  the  aspiring  curiosity,  which  impels  the 
adventurous  traveller  to  untrodden  regions,  will 
earn  discoveries,  not  for  himself  alone,  but  for  all 
men — if  their  curiosity  be  but  strong  enough  for 
the  perusal  of  his  agreeable  record,  under  the 
shelter,  and  amid  the  comforts  of  their  own  home. 
And  it  is  so  in  all  the  sciences.  The  unquench¬ 
able  thirst  of  a  few,  is  ever  drawing  supplies  o-f 
new  truth,  which  are  shared  in  by  thousands. 
There  is  an  obvious  meaning  in  this  variety, 
between  the  stronger  curiosity  of  the  few  who  dis¬ 
cover  truth,  and  the  weaker  curiosity  of  the  many 
who  acquire  it.  The  food  which  hunger  impels 
man  to  take  is  for  his  own  aliment  alone.  The 
fruit  of  that  study  to  which  the  strength  of  his  own 
curiosity  impels  him,  may  become  the  property  of 
all  men. 

4.  But,  apart  from  this  singularity,  we  behold 
in  curiosity,  viewed  as  a  general  attribute,  a  mani¬ 
fest  adaptation  to  the  circumstances  in  which  man 
is  placed.  If,  on  the  one  hand,  we  look  to  the 
rich  and  exhaustless  variety  of  truth,  in  a  universe 
fraught  with  the  materials  of  a  most  stupendous 
and  ever-growing  philosophy,  and  each  department 
of  which  is  fitted  to  stimulate  and  regale  the 
curiosity  of  the  human  mind — we  should  say  of 
such  an  external  nature  as  this,  that,  presenting  a 
most  appropriate  field  to  the  inquisitive  spirit  of 
our  race,  it  was  signally  adapted  to  the  intellectual 
constitution  of  man.  Or  if,  on  the  other  hand, 
besides  looking  to  the  world  as  a  theatre  for  the 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


2D1 


delightful  entertainment  of  our  powers,  we  behold 
it,  in  the  intricacy  of  its  phenomena  and  laws,  in 
its  recondite  mysteries,  in  its  deep  and  difficult 
recesses,  yet  conquerable  to  an  indefinite  extent 
by  the  perseverance  of  man,  and  therefore  as  a 
befitting  theatre  for  the  busy  and  most  laborious 
exercise  of  his  powers — we  should  say  of  such  an 
intellectual  constitution  as  ours,  that  it  was  signally 
adapted  to  the  system  of  external  nature.  It 
would  require  a  curiosity  as  strong  and  stedfast  as 
nature  hath  given  us,  to  urge  us  onward,  through 
the  appalling  difficulties  of  a  search  so  laborious. 
Hunger  is  the  great  impellent  to  corporeal  labour, 
and  the  gratification  of  this  appetite  is  its  reward. 
Curiosity  is  a  great  impellent  to  mental  labour, 
and,  whether  we  look  to  the  delights  or  the  diffi¬ 
culties  of  knowledge,  we  cannot  fail  to  perceive, 
that  this  mental  appetency  in  man,  and  its  coun¬ 
terpart  objects  in  nature,  are  suited  with  marvellous 
exactness  to  each  other. 

5.  But  the  analogy  between  the  mental^  and 
the  corporeal  affections  does  not  stop  here.  The 
appetite  of  hunger  would  of  itself  impel  to  the  use 
of  food — although  no  additional  pleasure  had 
been  annexed  to  the  use  of  it,  in  the  gratifications 
of  the  palate.  The  sense  of  taste,  with  its  various 
pleasurable  sensations,  has  ever  been  regarded  as 
a  distinct  proof  of  the  benevolence  and  care  of 
God.  And  the  same  is  true  of  the  delights 
vliich  are  felt  by  the  mind  in  the  acquisition  o: 
knowledge — as  when  truth  discloses  her  high  an  I 
hidden  beauties  to  the  eye  of  the  enrapture  ! 
student ;  and  he  breathes  an  ethereal  satisfaction. 


292  FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


having  in  it  the  very  substance  of  enjoyment, 
though  the  world  at  large  cannot  sympathize  with 
it.  The  pleasures  of  the  intellect,  though  calm, 
are  intense ;  insomuch,  that  a  life  of  deep  philoso¬ 
phy  were  a  life  of  deep  emotion,  when  the  under¬ 
standing  receives  of  its  own  proper  aliment — 
having  found  its  way  to  those  harmonies  of  prin¬ 
ciple,  those  goodly  classifications  of  phenomena, 
which  the  disciples  of  science  love  to  gaze  upon. 
And  the  whole  charm  does  not  lie  in  the  ultimate 
discovery.  There  is  a  felt  triumph  in  the  march, 
and  along  the  footsteps  of  the  demonstration 
which  leads  to  it ;  in  the  successive  evolutions  of 
the  reasoning,  as  well  as  its  successful  conclusion. 
Like  every  other  enterprise  of  man,  there  is  a 
happiness  in  the  current  and  continuous  pursuit, 
as  well  as  in  the  final  attainment — as  every  student 
in  geometry  can  tell,  who  will  remember  not  only 
the  delight  he  felt  on  his  arrival  at  the  landing 
place,  but  the  delight  he  felt  when  guided  onward 
by  the  traces  and  concatenations  of  the  pathway. 
Even  in  the  remotest  abstractions  of  contempla¬ 
tive  truth,  there  is  a  glory  and  a  transcendental 
pleasure,  which  the  world  knoweth  not ;  but  which 
becomes  more  intelligible,  because  more  imbodied, 
where  the  attention  of  the  inquirer  is  directed  to 
the  realities  of  substantive  nature.  And  though 
there  be  few  who  comprehend  or  follow  Newton 
in  his  gigantic  walk,  yet  all  may  participate  in 
his  triumphant  feeling,  when  he  reached  that  lofty 
summit,  where  the  whole  mystery  and  magnificence 
of  Nature  stood  submitted  to  his  gaze — an  emi¬ 
nence  won  by  him  through  the  power  and  the 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMO'J'IONS. 


293 


patience  of  intellect  alone;  but  from  which  he 
descried  a  scene  more  glorious  far  than  imagination 
could  have  formed,  or  than  ever  had  been  pictured 
and  set  forth  in  the  sublimest  visions  of  poetry. 

6.  It  is  thus  that  while  the  love  of  beautv, 
operating  upon  the  susceptible  imagination  of  the 
them ist,  is  one  of  those  seducing  influences  which 
lead  men  astray  from  the  pursuit  of  experimental 
truth,  he,  in  fact,  who  at  the  outset,  resists  her 
fascinations,  because  of  his  supreme  respect  for 
the  lessons  of  observation,  is  at  length  repaid  by 
the  discoveries  and  sights  ot  a  surpassing  loveli¬ 
ness.  1  he  inductive  pliilosophy  began  its  career 
by  a  renunciation,  painful  we  have  no  doubt  at  first 
to  many  of  its  disciples,  of  all  the  systems  and  har¬ 
monies  of  the  schoolmen.  13ut  in  the  assiduous 
prosecution  of  its  labours,  it  worked  its  way 
to  a  far  nobler  and  more  magnificent  harmony 
at  the  last  to  the  real  system  of  the  universe, 
more  excellent  than  all  the  schemes  of  human  con¬ 
ception — not  in  the  solidity  of  its  evidence  alone, 
but  as  an  object  of  tasteful  contemplation.  But 
the  toils  of  investigation  must  be  endured  first, 
that  the  grace  and  the  grandeur  might  be  enjoyed 
afterwards.  The  same  is  true  of  science  in  all  its 
departments,  not  of  simple  and  sublime  astronomy 
alone,  but  throughout  of  terrestrial  physics ;  and 
most  of  all  in  chemistry,  where  the  internal  pro¬ 
cesses  of  actual  and  ascertained  Nature  are  found 
to  possess  a  beauty,  which  far  surpasses  the  crude 
though  specious  plausibilities  of  other  days.  We 
perceive  in  this,  too,  a  fine  adaptation  of  the 
external  world  to  the  faculties  of  man ;  a  happy 


294  riNAi.  ca'tisf.s  of  the  f.motions 


ordination  of  Nature  by  which  the  labour  of  the 
spirit  IS  made  to  preceae  the  luxury  of  the  spirit, 
or  every  disciple  of  science  must  strenuously 
labour  in  the  investigation  of  its  truth  ere  he  can 
luxuriate  in  the  contemplation  of  its  beauties.  It 
is  by  the  patient  seeking  of  truth  first,  that  the 
pleasures  of  taste  and  imagination  are  superadded 
to  him. 

7.  But,  beside  those  rewards  and  excitements 
to  science  which  lie  in  science  itself,  as  the  curiosity 
which  impels  to  the  prosecution  of  it,  and  the 
delights  of  prosperous  study,  and  the  pleasures 
that  immediately  spring  from  the  contemplation  of 
its  objects — besides  these,  there  is  a  remoter  but 
not  less  powerful  influence,  and  to  which  indeed 
w^e  owe  greatly  more  than  half  the  jihilosophy  of 
our  world.  We  mean  the  respect  in  which  high 
intellectual  endowments  are  held  by  general  society. 
We  are  not  sure  but  that  the  love  of  fame  has 
been  of  more  powerful  operation,  in  speeding  onward 
the  march  of  discovery,  than  the  love  of  philosophy 
for  the  sake  of  its  own  inherent  charms  ;  and  there 
are  thousands  of  our  most  distinguished  intellectual 
labourers,  who,  but  for  an  expected  harvest  of 
renown,  would  never  have  entered  on  the  secret 
and  solitary  prosecution  of  their  arduous  walk. 
We  are  abundantly  sensible,  that  this  appetency 
for  fame  may  have  helped  to  vulgarize  both  the 
literature  and  science  of  the  country  ;  that  men, 
capable  of  the  most  Attic  refinement  in  the  one, 
may,  for  the  sake  of  a  wider  popularity,  have 
descended  to  verbiage  and  the  false  splendour  of  a 
meretricious  eloq^ueoce ;  and  that  men,  capable  of 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  295 


the  deepest  research  and  purest  demonstration  in 
the  other,  may,  by  the  same  unworthy  compliance 
\vitli  the  flippancy  of  the  public  taste,  have  ex¬ 
changed  the  profound  argument  for  the  super¬ 
ficial  illustration — preferring  to  the  homage  of 
the  exalted  few,  the  attendance  and  plaudits  of 
the  multitude.  It  is  thus,  that,  when  access  to 
the  easier  and  lighter  parts  of  knowledge  has  been 
suddenly  enlarged,  the  heights  of  philosojihy  may 
be  abandoned  for  a  season — the  men  who  wont  to 
occupy  these,  being  tempted  to  come  down  from 
their  elevation,  and  hold  converse  with  that  increas¬ 
ing  host,  who  have  entered  within  the  precincts, 
and  now  throng  the  outer  courts  of  the  temple. 
It  is  thus,  that  at  certain  transition  periods,  in  the 
intellectual  history  of  the  species,  philosophy  may 
sustain  a  temporary  depression — from  which  when 
she  recovers,  we  shall  combine,  with  the  inesti¬ 
mable  benefit  of  a  more  enlightened  commonalty, 
both  the  glory  and  the  substantial  benefit  of  as 
cultured  a  literature  and  as  lofty  and  elaborate  a 
philosophy  as  before.  But  we  greatly  mistake,  if 
we  think,  that  in  these  minds  of  nobler  and  purer 
ambition,  the  love  of  fame  is  extinguished,  because 
they  are  willing  to  forego  the  bustling  attendance 
and  the  clamorous  applauses  of  a  crowd. 

8.  The  vast  importance  of  the  emotions  to 
human  happiness,  is  obvious  from  this — that  a 
state  of  mental  happiness  cannot  even  so  much  as 
be  imagined  without  a  state  of  emotion.  They 
are  the  emotions,  in  fact,  and  the  external  affec¬ 
tions  together,  which  share  between  them  the 
whole  interest,  whether  pleasurable  or  painful,  of 


296  FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 

human  existence.  And  what  a  vivid  and  varied 
interest  that  is,  may  be  rendered  evident  by  a 
mere  repetition  of  those  words  which  compose  the 
nomenclature  of  our  feelings — as  hope,  and  fear, 
and  grief,  and  joy  and  love  diversified  into  so 
many  separate  affections  towards  wealth,  fame, 
power,  knowledge,  and  all  the  other  objects  of 
human  desire,  besides  the  tasteful  and  benevolent 
emotions  which  altogether  keep  their  unremitting 
play  in  the  heart,  and  sustain  or  fill  up  the  con¬ 
tinuity  of  our  sensible  being.  It  says  enough  for 
the  adaptation  of  external  nature  to  a  mental 
constitution  so  complexly  and  variously  endowed, 
that,  numerous  as  these  susceptibilities  are,  the 
world  is  crowded  with  objects  that  keep  them  in 
full  and  busy  occupation.  The  details  of  this 
contemplation  are  inexhaustible ;  and  we  are  not 
sure  but  that  the  general  lesson  of  the  Divine 
care  or  Divine  benevolence,  which  may  be  founded 
upon  these,  could  be  more  effectually  learned  by 
a  close  attention  of  the  mind  to  one  specific 
instance,  than  by  a  complete  enumeration  of  all 
the  instances,  with  at  the  same  time  only  a  briefer 
and  slighter  notice  of  each  of  them. 

9.  And  it  would  m.ake  the  lesson  all  the  more 
impressive,  if,  instead  of  selecting  as  our  example 
an  emotion  of  very  exalted  character,  and  of  which 
the  influence  on  human  enjoyment  stood  forth  in 
bright  daylight  to  the  observation  of  all,  such  as 
the  sensibility  of  a  heart  that  was  feelingly  alive  to 
the  calls  of  benevolence,  or  feelingly  alive  to  the 
beauties  of  nature — we  should  take  for  our  case 
gome  other  kmd  of  emotion,  so  common,  perhaps. 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EJIOTIONS.  297 

% 

as  to  be  ignobly  familiar,  and  on  which  one  would 
scarcely  think  of  constructing  aught  so  dignified 
as  a  theological  argument.  Yet  we  cannot  help 
thinking,  that  it  most  emphatically  tells  us  of  the 
teeming,  the  profuse  benevolence  of  the  Deity— 
when  we  reflect  on  those  homelier  and  those  every¬ 
day  resources,  out  of  which  the  whole  of  human 
life,  through  the  successive  hours  of  it,  is  seasoned 
wdth  enjoyment ;  and  a  most  agreeable  zest  is 
imparted  from  them  to  the  ordinary  occasions  of 
converse  and  companionship  among  men.  When 
the  love  of  novelty  finds  in  the  walks  of  science  the 
gratification  that  is  suited  to  it,  we  can  reason 
gravely  on  the  final  cause  of  the  emotion,  and 
speak  of  the  purpose  of  Nature,  or  rather  of  the 
Author  of  Nature,  in  having  instituted  such  a 
reward  for  intellectual  labour.  But  we  lose  siafht 

O 

of  all  the  wisdom  and  all  the  goodness  that  are 
connected  with  this  mental  ordination — when  the 
very  same  principle,  which  in  the  lofty  and  liberal 
savant,  we  call  the  love  of  novelty,  becomes  in  the 
plain  and  ordinary  citizen,  the  love  of  news.  Yet 
in  this  humbler  and  commonplace  form,  it  is  need¬ 
less  to  say  how  prolific  it  is  of  enjoyment — giving 
an  edge,  as  it  were,  to  the  whole  of  one’s  conscious 
existence,  and  its  principal  charm  to  the  innocent 
and  enlivening  gossip  of  every  social  party. 
Perhaps  a  still  more  effective  exemplification  may 
be  had  in  another  emotion  of  this  class,  that  which 
arises  from  our  sense  of  the  ludicrous — which  so 
often  ministers  to  the  gaiety  of  man’s  heart  even 
when  alone ;  and  which,  when  he  congregates  with 
his  fellows,  is  ever  and  anon  breaking  forth  into 

N  2 


298  FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 

some  humorous  conception,  that  infects  alike  the 
fancies  of  all,  and  finds  vent  in  one  common  shout 
of  ecstasy.  Like  every  other  emotion,  it  stands 
allied  with  a  perception  as  its  antecedent,  the 
object  of  the  perception  in  this  instance  being  the 
conjunction  of  things  that  are  incongruous  with 
each  other — on  the  first  discovery  or  perception  of 
which,  the  mirth  begins  to  tumultuate  in  the  heart 
of  some  one;  and  on  the  first  utterance  of  which, 
it  passes  with  irrepressible  sympathy  into  the 
hearts  of  all  who  are  around  him — whence  it 
obtains  the  same  ready  discharge  as  before,  in  a 
loud  and  general  efifervescence.  To  perceive  how 
inexhaustible  the  source  of  this  enjoyment  is,  wo 
have  only  to  think  of  it  in  connexion  with  its 
cause ;  and  then  try  to  compute,  if  we  can,  all  the 
possibilities  of  wayward  deviation,  from  the  sober 
literalities  of  truth  and  nature,  whether  in  the 
shape  of  new  imaginations  by  the  mind  of  man,  or 
of  new  combinations  and  events  in  actual  history. 
It  is  thus  that  the  pleasure  connected  with  our 
sense  of  the  ludicrous,  forms  one  of  the  most 
current  gratifications  of  human  life ;  nor  is  it 
essential  that  there  should  be  any  rare  peculiarity 
if  mental  conformation,  in  order  to  realize  it.  We 
find  it  the  perennial  source  of  a  sort  of  gentle  and 
quiet  delectation,  even  to  men  of  the  most  sober 
tempei’ament,  and  whose  habit  is  as  remote  as 
possible  from  that  of  fantastic  levity,  or  wild  and 
airy  extravagance.  When  acquaintances  meet 
together  in  the  street,  and  hold  colloquy  for  a  few 
minutes,  they  may  look  grave  enough,  if  business 
•jr  politics  or  some  matter  of  serious  intelligence 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  299 

be  the  theme — yet  how  seldom  do  they  part  before 
some  coruscation  of  playfulness  has  been  struck  out 
between  them;  and  the  interview,  though  begun 
perhaps  in  sober  earnest,  but  seldom  passes  off  with¬ 
out  some  pleasantry  or  other  to  enliven  it.  We  should 
not  dwell  so  long  on  this  part  of  the  human  constitu¬ 
tion  were  there  not  so  much  of  happiness  and  so 
much  of  benevolence  allied  with  it — as  is  obvious, 
indeed  from  the  very  synonymes  to  which  the  lan¬ 
guage  employed  for  the  expression  of  its  various 
phenomena  and  feelings  has  given  rise.  To  what 
else  but  to  the  pleasure  we  have  in  the  ludicrous 
is  it  owing,  that  a  ludicrous  observation  has  been 
termed  a  pleasantry ;  or  how  but  to  the  affinity 
between  happiness  and  mirth  can  we  ascribe  it, 
that  the  two  terms  are  often  employed  as  equiva¬ 
lent  to  each  other ;  and  whence  but  from  the 
strong  connexion  which  consists  between  benevo¬ 
lence  and  humour  can  it  be  explained,  that  a  man 
is  said  to  be  in  good  humour  when  in  a  state  of 
placidness  and  cordiality  with  all  who  are  around 
him  ?  We  are  aware  that  there  is  not  a  single 
disposition  whereAvith  Nature  hath  endowed  us, 
which  may  not  bo  perverted  to  evil ;  but  when  we 
see  so  much  both  of  human  kindness  and  of  human 
enjoyment  associated  with  that  exhilaration  of 
heart  to  which  this  emotion  is  so  constantly  giving 
rise — ministering  with  such  copiousness,  both  to 
the  smiles  of  the  domestic  hearth,  and  the  gaieties 
of  festive  companionship — we  cannot  but  regard 
it  as  the  provision  of  an  indulgent  Father,  who 
hath  ordained  it  as  a  sweetener  or  an  emollient  amid 
the  annoyances  and  ills  v  hich  flesh  is  heir  to 


300 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EITOTIONS. 


10.  It  were  diflScult  to  compute  the  whole  eacet 
of  this  ingredient,  in  alleviating  the  vexations  of 
life ;  but  certain  it  is,  that  the  ludicrous  is  often 
blended  with  the  annoyances  which  befall  us  ;  and 
that  its  operation,  in  lightening  the  pressure  of 
what  might  have  otherwise  been  viewed  as  some¬ 
what  in  the  light  of  a  calamity,  is  far  from  incon¬ 
siderable.  This  balancing  of  opposite  emotions, 
suggested  by  different  parts  of  the  same  complex 
event  or  object,  and  the  effect  of  the  one  if  a  plea¬ 
sant  emotion,  in  assuaging  the  painfulness  of  the 
other,  is  not  an  uncommon  phenomenon  in  the 
exhibitions  of  human  feeling.  A  very  obvious 
specimen  of  this  is  afforded  by  an  acquaintance 
in  the  act  of  falling.  There  is  no  doubt  an 
incongruity  between  the  moment  of  his  walking 
uprightly,  and  with  the  full  anticipation  of  getting 
forward  in  that  attitude  to  the  object  whither  he 
is  bending — and  the  next  moment  of  his  floundering 
in  the  mud,  and  hastening  with  all  his  might  to 
gather  himself  up  again.  They  who  philosophize 
upon  the  laws  of  succession  in  the  events  of  Nature, 
have  a  great  demand  for  such  successions  as  are 
immediate.  They  go  busily  in  quest  of  the  conti¬ 
guous  links,  and  properly  conceive  that  if  any  one 
hidden  step  be  yet  interposed,  between  the  two 
which  they  regularly  observe  to  follow  each  other, 
they  have  not  completed  the  investigation  till  that 
step  also  have  been  ascertained.  It  is  therefore, 
so  far  an  advantage,  in  regard  to  the  above  pheno¬ 
menon,  that  there  does  not  appear  to  be  time  even 
for  the  most  rapid  and  fugitive  intervention — for 
only  let  it  occur  in  the  presence  of  lookers  on,  and. 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  301 

With  the  speed  of  lightning,  will  it  be  followed  up 
by  the  instant  and  obstreperous  glee  of  a  whole 
host  of  spectatorship. 

11.  But  this  very  exhibition  may  give  rise  to 
a  wholly  different  emotion.  The  provocative  to 
laughter  lies  in  the  awkwardness  of  the  fall.  Let 
the  awkwardness  be  conceived  to  abide  as  it  was, 
and  this  other  ingredient  to  be  added,  the  severity 
of  the  fall— that  a  limb  is  fractured,  or  that  a  swoon, 
a  convulsion,  or  a  stream  of  blood  is  the  immedi¬ 
ate  consequence.  In  proportion  to  the  hurt  that 
was  sustained,  would  be  the  sympathy  of  far  the 
greater  number  of  the  bystanders  ;  and  this  might 
be  so  heightened  by  the  palpable  sufferings  of 
him  to  whom  the  accident  has  befallen,  that  the 
sense  of  the  ludicrous  might  be  entirely  overborne. 

12.  The  two  provocatives  are  the  awkwardness 
of  the  fall  and  its  severity.  The  two  emotions  are 
the  mirth  and  the  compassion.  The  one  of  these 
may  so  predominate  over  the  other  as  to  leave  the 
mind  under  its  entire  and  single  ascendancy.  A 
mathematician  would  require  the  point  at  which, 
by  a  gi’adual  increase  or  diminution  upon  either  of 
the  two  elements,  they  were  mutually  neutralised 

or  the  transition  was  made  from  the  one  to  the 
other  of  them.  In  this  we  may  not  be  able  to  satisfy 
him.  But  all  may  have  been  sensible  of  an  oc¬ 
casion,  when  the  two  were  so  delicately  poised, 
that  the  mind  positively  vibrated — so  as  to  make 
a  sort  of  b-emulous  and  intermediate  play  between 
these  distinct  and  nearly  opposite  emotions.  This 
is  one  of  those  nicer  exhibitions  of  our  nature  that 
one  feels  an  interest  in  remarking  ;  and  many  per- 


302 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


haps  may  recollect  the  instances,  when  even  some 
valued  friend  hath  smarted  pretty  seriously,  under 
some  odd  or  ludicrous  misha})  in  which  he  hath 
been  involved,  and  when  they  have  felt  themselves 
in  a  state  of  most  curious  ambiguity,  between  the 
pity  which  they  ought  to  feel,  and  the  levity  which 
they  were  not  able  to  repress.  The  peculiarities 
of  this  midway  condition  are  greatly  aggravated, 
if  there  be  so  many  acquaintances  who  share  it 
among  them,  and  more  especially,  if  they  meet 
together  and  talk  over  the  subject  of  it — in  which 
case,  it  will  be  no  singular  display  of  our  mysteri¬ 
ous  nature,  although  the  visitations  of  a  common 
sympathy  should  be  found  to  alternate  with  the 
high-sounding  peals  of  a  most  rapturous  and  un¬ 
controllable  merriment. 

13.  We  cannot  fail  to  perceive,  in  this  instance 
too,  how  inseparable  the  alliance  is  between  per¬ 
ception  and  feeling.  According  as  the  mind  looks, 
so  is  the  heart  affected.  When  we  look  to  the 
awkwardness  of  the  mischance,  whatever  it  may 
be,  we  become  gay.  When  we  look  to  its  severity, 
we  become  sad.  It  is  instructive  to  observe  with 
w'hat  fidelity  the  heart  follows  the  mind  in  this 
process,  and  how  whichever  the  object  is  that  for 
the  time  is  regarded  by  the  one,  it  is  sure  to  be 
responded  to  by  an  appropriate  emotion  from  the 
other. 

14.  We  should  not  have  ventured  on  these  illus¬ 
trations  but  for  the  lesson  which  they  serve  to 
establish.  They  prove  the  extent  to  which  a 
sense  of  the  ludicrous  might  lighten  and  divert  the 
painfulness  of  those  serious  feelings  to  which 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


303 


humanity  is  exposed.  It  is  true  that  much  evil 
may  be  done,  when  it  puts  to  flight,  as  it  often 
does,  seriousness  of  principle ;  but,  on  the  other 
hand,  there  is  unquestionable  good  done  by  it, 
when  it  puts  to  flight,  either  the  seriousness  of 
resentment,  or  the  seriousness  of  suffering.  And 
when  we  think  of  its  frequent  and  powerful  effect, 
both  in  softening  the  malignant  asperities  of  debate, 
and  in  reconciling  us  to  those  misadventures  and 
pettier  miseries  of  life,  which,  if  not  so  alleviated, 
would  keep  us  in  a  state  of  continual  festerment — 
we  cannot  hut  regard  even  this  humbler  part  of 
the  constitution  of  man  as  a  palpable  testimony 
both  to  the  wisdom  and  goodness  of  Him  who 
framed  us.* 

•  “  The  advantages  which  we  derive  fi-om  our  susceptibility 
of  this  species  of  emotion,  are  in  their  immediate  influence  on 
the  cheerfulness,  and  therefore  on  the  general  happiness  of  society, 
Bufiiciently  obvious.  How  many  hours  would  pass  heavily  along, 
but  for  those  pleasantries  of  wit,  or  of  easier  and  less  pretending 
gaiety,  which  enliven  what  would  have  been  dull,  and  throw 
many  bright  colours  on  what  would  have  been  gloomy  !  We  are 
not  to  estimate  these  accessions  of  pleasure  lightly,  Ijecause  they 
relate  to  objects  that  may  seem  trifling,  when  considered  together 
with  those  more  serious  concerns,  by  which  our  ambition  is  occu¬ 
pied,  and  in  relation  to  which,  in  the  success  or  failure  of  our 
various  projects,  we  look  back  on  the  past  months  or  years  of 
our  life  as  fortunate  or  unfortunate.  If  these  serious  concerns 
alone  were  to  .be  regarded,  we  might  often  have  been  very  fortu¬ 
nate  and  very  unhappy,  as  in  other  circumstances  we  might  often 
have  had  much  happiness  in  the  hours  and  days  of  years,  which 
terminated  at  last  in  the  disappointment  of  some  favourite  scheme. 
It  is  good  to  travel  with  pure  and  balmy  airs  and  cheerful  sun¬ 
shine,  though  we  should  not  find,  at  the  end  of  our  journey,  the 
friend  whom  we  wished  to  see  ;  and  the  gaieties  of  social  converse, 
though  they  are  not,  in  our  journey  of  life,  what  we  travel  to  ob¬ 
tain,  are  during  the  continuance  of  our  journey  at  once  a  fresh¬ 
ness  which  we  breathe,  and  a  light  that  gives  every  object  to 
sparkle  to  our  eyes  with  a  radiance  that  is  not  its  own.” — Brown  a 
Lectures- — Lecture  59.  But  this  emotion  is  allied  with  benevo¬ 
lence  as  well  as  with  tiijoj'ment.  'I'jkore  is  perhaps  not  a  more 


304 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS, 


15.  The  usefulness  of  the  emotions  is  no  more 
owing  to  a  moral  principle  in  him  who  experiences 
their  force,  than  the  usefulness  of  the  animal 
instincts  is  owing  to  a  moral  principle  on  the  part 
of  the  inferior  creatures.  The  usefulness  of  both 

'  is  directly  and  solely  referable  to  the  benevolence 
of  the  Deity  ;  and  even  when  we  pass  upward  from 
emotions  to  virtues,  we  should  recollect  that  the 
practice  of  these  is,  in  the  arrangements  of  an  all- 
virtuous  God,  generally  followed  up  by  the  happiest 
consequences,  both  to  individuals  and  to  society  at 
large.  Now,  in  as  far  as  the  virtues  are  practised 
by  man  because  of  their  consequences,  it  is  not 
virtue,  but  an  enlightened  and  an  enlarged  selfish¬ 
ness  which  prompts  him  to  the  doing  of  them. 
And  ere,  therefore,  we  quit  this  part  of  our  argu¬ 
ment,  we  shall  consider  a  further  deduction  to  be 
made  from  the  essential  morality  of  the  human 
character,  in  the  delusive  estimates  that  we  are 
apt  to  form  of  it. 

16.  This  we  more  readily  do,  for  though  other 
emotions  of  our  nature  might  be  alleged  as  indica¬ 
tions  of  design,  on  these  we  forbear  to  expatiate, 
because  however  effective  as  proofs,  they  possess 
a  character  of  such  extreme  obviousness,  as  to 
require  no  anxious  or  formal  explanation ;  but, 
on  the  instant  of  being  presented  to  their  notice, 
are  read  and  recognised  by  all  men.  One  patent 
example  of  this  in  the  constitution  of  man,  is  the 

welcome  topic  at  the  tables  of  the  great,  than  the  characteristic 
peculiarities  or  oddities  of  humble  life — and  we  have  no  doubt 
that  along  with  the  amusement  which  is  felt  in  the  cottage  anec¬ 
dotes  of  a  domain,  there  is  often  awakened  hy  them,  a  benevo 
lent  interest  in  the  well-being  of  the  occupiers. 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


305 


force  and  prevalence  of  compassion — an  endowment 
which  could  not  have  proceeded  from  a  malig¬ 
nant  being ;  but  which  evinces  the  Author  of  our 
nature  to  be  Himself  compassionate  and  generous. 
But  we  now  pass  on  to  another  thing  alike  patent 
and  recognisable,  we  mean  not  of  a  virtuous  prin¬ 
ciple  in  the  human  constitution,  but  of  such  an 
adaptation  of  the  external  world  to  that  constitu 
tion — that,  with  the  virtuous  practice  which  that 
principle  would  both  originate  and  sustain,  the 
outward  and  general  prosperity  of  man  is  indispen¬ 
sably  connected.  We  mean  the  manifest  and 
indispensable  subserviency  of  a  general  truth  in 
the  world  to  the  general  well-being  of  society.  It 
is  difficult  to  imagine,  that  a  God  of  infinite  power 
and  consummate  skill  of  workmanship,  but  withal 
a  lover  of  falsehood,  would  have  devised  such  a 
world ;  or,  rather  that  he  would  not,  in  patronage 
to  those  of  his  own  likeness,  have  ordered  the  whole 
of  its  system  differently — so  reversing  its  present 
laws  and  sequences,  as  that,  instead  of  honour  and 
integrity,  duplicity,  disingenuousness,  and  fraud, 
should  have  been  the  usual  stepping-stones  to  the 
possession  both  of  this  world’s  esteem  and  of  this 
world’s  enjoyments.  How  palpably  opposite  this 
is  to  the  actual  economy  of  things,  the  whole  ex¬ 
perience  of  life  abundantly  testifies — making  it 
evident,  of  individual  examples,  that  the  connexion 
between  honesty  and  success  in  the  world  is  the 
rule  ;  the  connexion  between  dishonesty  and  suc¬ 
cess  is  the  exception.  But  perhaps,  instead  of 
attempting  the  induction  of  particular  cases,  we 
should  observe  a  still  more  distinct  avowal  of  the 


30ti  FINAL  CAL'SKS  UF  THE  EiMOTlONS. 

character  of  God,  of  His  favour  for  truth,  and  of 
the  discountenance  which  He  has  laid  upon  false- 
liood,  by  tracing,  which  could  be  easily  done  in 
imagination,  the  effect  it  would  have  in  society,  if, 
all  things  else  remaining  unaltered,  there  should 
this  single  difference  be  introduced,  of  a  predomi¬ 
nant  falsehood,  instead  of  a  predominant  truth  in 
the  world.  The  consequences  of  a  universal  dis¬ 
trust,  in  the  almost  universal  stoppage  that  would 
ensue  of  the  useful  interchanges  of  life,  are  too 
obvious  to  be  enumerated.  The  world  of  trade 
would  henceforth  break  up  into  a  state  of  anarchy, 
or  rather  be  paralyzed  into  a  state  of  cessation 
and  stillness.  The  mutual  confidence  between 
man  and  man,  if  not  the  mainspring  of  commerce, 
is  at  least  the  oil,  without  which  its  movements 
were  impracticable.  And  were  truth  to  disappear, 
and  all  dependence  on  human  testimony  to  bo 
destroyed,  this  is  not  the  only  interest  which  w  ould 
be  ruined  by  it.  It  would  vitiate,  and  that  incur¬ 
ably,  every  social  and  every  domestic  i  elationship ; 
and  all  the  charities  as  well  as  all  the  comforts  of 
life  wmuld  take  their  departure  from  the  world. 

17.  Seeing  then  that  the  observation  of  honesty 
and  truth  is  of  such  vital  importance  to  society, 
that  without  it  society  would  cease  to  keep  together 
— it  might  be  well  to  ascertain,  by  what  special 
provision  it  is  in  the  constitution  of  man,  that  the 
practice  of  these  virtues  is  upheld  in  the  world. 
Did  it  proceed  in  every  instance  from  the  natural 
power  and  love  of  integrity  in  the  heart — w'e  should 
rejoice  in  contemplating  this  alliance  between  the 
worth  of  man’s  character,  on  the  one  hand  ;  and  the 


FINAL  OAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  307 

security,  as  well  as  the  abundance  of  his  outward 
comforts,  upon  the  other.  And  such,  in  fact,  is 
the  habitual  disposition  to  truth  in  the  world — 
that,  in  spite  of  the  great  moral  depravation  into 
which  our  species  has  obviously  fallen,  we  probably 
do  not  overrate  the  proportion,  when  we  affirm, 
that  at  least  a  hundred  truths  are  uttered  among 
men  for  one  falsehood.  But  then,  in  the  vast 
majority  of  cases,  there  is  no  temptation  to  struggle 
with,  nothing  by  which  to  try  or  to  estimate  the 
strength  of  the  virtue — so  that,  without  virtue 
being  at  all  concerned  in  it,  man’s  words  might 
spontaneously  flow  in  the  natural  current  of  his 
ideas,  of  the  knowledge  or  the  convictions  which 
belong  to  him.  But  more  than  this.  Instead  of 
selfishness  seducing  man,  which  it  often  does,  from 
the  observations  of  truth  and  honesty — it  vastly 
oftener  is  on  the  side  of  these  observations. 
Generally  speaking,  it  is  not  more  his  interest  that 
he  should  have  men  of  integrity  to  deal  with — than 
that  he  himself  should  in  his  own  dealings,  be 
strictly  observant  of  this  virtue.  To  be  abandoned 
by  the  confidence  of  his  fellows,  he  would  find  to 
be  not  more  mortifying  to  his  pride,  than  ruinous 
to  his  prosperity  in  the  world.  We  are  aware  that 
many  an  occasional  harvest  is  made  from  deceit 
and  injustice;  but,  in  the  vast  majority  of  cases, 
men  would  cease  to  thrive  when  they  ceased  to  be 
trusted.  A  man’s  actual  truth  is  not  more  bene¬ 
ficial  to  others,  than  the  reputation  of  it  is  gainful 
to  himself.  And  therefore  it  is,  that,  throughout 
the  mercantile  world,  men  are  as  sensitive  of  an 
aspersion  on  their  name,  as  they  would  be  of  an 


308 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


encroachment  on  their  property.  The  one,  in  fact, 
is  tantamount  to  the  other.  It  is  thus,  that,  under 
the  constraints  of  selfishness  alone,  fidelity  and 
justice  may  be  in  copious  and  current  observation 
among  men ;  and  while,  perhaps,  the  principle  of 
these  virtues  is  exceedingly  frail  and  uncertain  in 
all  hearts — human  society  may  still  subsist  by  the 
literal  and  outward  observation  of  them. 

18.  Here  then  is  the  example,  not  of  a  virtue 
in  principle,  but  of  a  virtue  in  performance,  with  all 
the  indispensable  benefits  of  that  performance,  being 
sustained  on  the  soil  of  selfishness.  Were  a  pro¬ 
found  observer  of  human  life  to  take  account  of 
all  the  honesties  of  mercantile  intercourse,  he 
would  find  that,  in  the  general  amount  of  them,  they 
were  mainly  due  to  the  operation  of  this  cause ;  or 
that  they  were  so  prevalent  in  society,  because 
each  man  was  bound  to  their  observance,  by  the 
tie  of  his  own  personal  interest — insomuch  that,  if 
this  particular  tie  w'ere  broken,  it  would  as  surely 
derange  or  break  up  the  world  of  trade,  as  the 
world  of  matter  would  become  an  inert  or  turbid 
chaos,  on  the  repeal  or  suspension  of  the  law  of 
gravitation.  Confidence,  the  very  soul  of  com¬ 
mercial  enterprise,  and  without  which  the  transac¬ 
tions  of  merchandise  were  impossible,  is  the  goodly 
result,  not  of  that  native  respect  which  each  man 
has  for  another’s  rights,  but  of  that  native  regard 
which  each  man  has  for  his  own  special  advantage. 
'I'his  forms  another  example  of  a  great  and  general 
good  wrought  out  for  society — while  each  compon¬ 
ent  member  is  intently  set  only  on  a  distinct  and 
specific  good  for  himself — a  high  interest,  which 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  309 

could  not  have  been  confided  to  human  virtue ;  but 
which  has  been  skilfully  extracted  from  the  work¬ 
ings  of  human  selfishness,  lii  as  far  as  truth  and 
justice  prevail  in  the  world,  not  by  the  operation 
of  principle  but  of  policy,  in  so  far  the  goodness  of 
man  has  no  share  in  it :  but  so  beneficent  a  result 
out  of  such  unpromising  materials,  speaks  all  the 
more  emphatically  both  for  the  wisdom  and  the 
goodness  of  God. 

19.  But  in  this  there  is  no  singularity.  Other 
examples  can  be  named  of  God  placing  us  in  such 
circumstances,  as  to  enlist  even  our  selfishness  on 
the  side  of  virtuous  conduct,  or  implanting  such 
special  affections  as  do,  by  their  own  impulse,  lead 
to  that  conduct,  although  virtuousness  is  not  in  all 
our  thoughts.  We  are  often  so  actuated,  as  to  do 
what  is  best  for  society,  at  the  very  time  that  the 
good  of  society  is  forming  no  part  of  our  concern ; 
and  our  footsteps  are  often  directed  in  that  very 
path,  which  a  moral  regard  to  the  greatest  happi¬ 
ness  of  the  species  would  dictate — without  any 
moral  purpose  having  been  conceived,  or  any 
moral  principle  been  in  exercise  within  us.  It  is 
thus  that  our  resentment  operates  as  a  check  on 
the  injuriousness  of  others,  although  our  single  aim 
be  the  protection  of  our  own  interests — not  the 
diminution  of  violence  or  injustice  in  the  world; 
and  thus  too  our  own  dread  of  resentment  from 
others,  works  the  same  outward  effect,  which 
honour  or  a  respect  for  their  rights  would  have 
had  upon  our  transactions,  which  delicacy  or  a 
respect  for  their  feelings  would  have  had  upon  our 
converse  with  those  around  us.  It  is  in  this  way 


310  FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 

that  God  makes  the  wrath  of  man  to  praise  him , 
and  the  same  is  true  of  other  affections  of  our 
nature,  which  have  less  the  character  of  selfishness 
than  either  anger  or  fear.  It  is  not  because 
prompted  by  a  sense  of  duty,  but  under  the  force 
of  a  mere  natural  proneness,  that  mothers  watch 
so  assiduously  over  the  helplessness,  and  fathers 
toil  so  painfully  for  the  subsistence  of  their  children. 
Even  compassion,  with  the  speed  and  the  discrimi¬ 
nation  of  its  movements,  does  for  human  life  more 
than  man  is  capable  of  doing  with  his  highest  efforts 
of  morality  and  reason — yet,  not  in  the  shape  of  a 
principle,  but  in  the  shape  of  a  strong  constitutional 
propensity.  The  good  is  rendered,  not  by  man 
acting  as  he  thinks  that  he  ought,  or  under  the 
force  of  a  moral  suggestion;  but  by  man  acting 
because  he  feels  himself  constrained,  as  if  by  the 
force  of  a  physical  necessity — not  surely  because, 
in  the  exercise  of  a  sovereign  liberty,  he  hath 
assumed  a  lordly  ascendant  over  all  the  inferior 
passions  of  his  nature ;  but  because  himself  is 
lorded  over  by  a  law  of  his  nature,  having  in  it  all 
the  might  and  mastery  of  a  passion.  It  is  when, 
in  the  contemplation  of  phenomena  like  these,  we 
are  enabled  to  view  man  as  an  instrument,  that 
we  are  also  led  more  clearly  to  perceive  who  the 
agent  is — not  the  being  who  is  endowed,  but  the 
Being  who  has  endowed  him.  The  instinct  of 
animals  is  a  substitute  for  their  wisdom ;  but,  at  the 
same  time,  a  palpable  demonstration  of  the  wisdom 
of  God.  Man  also  has  his  instincts,  which  serve 
as  the  substitutes  of  moral  goodness  in  him ;  but 
which  therefore  mark  all  the  more  strongly,  by 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  311 


their  beneficial  operation,  the  goodness  of  his 
Maker.* 

20.  To  see  how  widely  these  gifts  or  endow¬ 
ments  of  our  nature  by  the  hand  of  God,  may 
stand  apart  from  aught  like  proper  goodness  or 
virtue  in  the  heart  of  man — we  have  only  to  witness 
the  similar  provision  which  has  been  made  for 
the  care  and  preservation  of  the  inferior  animals. 
The  anger  which  arouses  to  defence  against  injury, 
and  the  fear  which  prompts  to  an  escape  from  it, 
and  the  maternal  affection  which  nourishes  and 
rears  forward  the  successive  young  into  a  condition 
of  strength  and  independence  for  the  protection  of 
themselves — these  all  have  their  indispensable  uses, 
for  upholding  and  perpetuating  the  various  tribes 
of  living  creatures,  who  at  the  same  time  are  alike 
incapable  of  morality  and  reason.  There  is  no 
moral  purpose  served  by  these  implantations,  so 
far  at  least  as  respects  the  creatures  themselves, 
with  whom  virtue  is  a  thing  utterly  incompetent 
and  unattainable.  In  reference  to  them,  they 
may  be  viewed  simply  as  beneficent  contrivances, 
and  as  bespeaking  no  other  characteristic  on  the 
part  of  the  Deity  than  that  of  pure  kindness  or 


■  Dr.  Smith  in  his  Theory  of  Moral  Sentiments  has  well 
remarked  that — “though  in  accounting  for  the  operations  of 
liodies,  we  never  fail  to  distinguish  the  efficient  from  the  final 
cause — in  accounting  for  those  of  the  mind,  we  are  very  apt  to 
confound  these  two  different  things  with  one  another.  When  by 
natural  principles  we  are  led  to  advance  those  ends  which  a  re- 
fined  and  enlightened  reason  would  recommend  to  us,  we  are  very 
apt  to  impute  to  that  reason,  as  to  their  efficient  cause,  the  senti¬ 
ments  and  actions  by  which  we  advance  those  ends,  and  to  imagine 
that  to  be  the  wisdom  of  man,  which  in  reality  is  the  wisdom 
of  God.” 


312  FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 

regard  for  the  happiness  and  safety,  throughout 
their  respective  generations,  of  the  creatures  whom 
He  has  made.  This  might  help  us  to  distinguish 
between  those  mental  endowments  of  our  own. 
species  which  have  but  for  their  object  the  com¬ 
fort  and  protection,  and  those  which  have  for  their 
object  tbe  character  of  man.  The  former  we 
have  in  common  with  the  inferior  animals ;  and  so 
far  they  only  discover  to  us  the  kindness  of  the 
divine  nature,  or  the  parental  and  benevolent  con¬ 
cern  which  God  takes  in  us.  The  latter  are 
peculiar  to  our  race,  and  are  indicated  by  certain 
phenomena  of  our  mental  nature,  in  which  the 
beasts  of  the  field  and  the  fowls  of  the  air  have  no 
shate  with  us — by  the  conscience  within  us, 
asserting  its  own  rightful  supremacy  over  all  our 
affections  and  doings  ;  by  our  capacities  for  virtue 
and  vice,  along  with  the  pleasures  or  the  pains 
which  are  respectively  blended  with  them ;  and 
finally  by  the  operation  of  habit,  whose  office  like 
that  of  a  schoolmaster,  is  to  perfect  our  education, 
and  to  fix,  in  one  way  or  other,  but  at  length 
immoveably,  the  character  of  its  disciples.  These 
present  us  with  a  distinct  exhibition  of  the  Deity, 
or  a  distinct  and  additional  relation  in  which  He 
stands  to  us — revealing  to  us,  not  Him  only  as  the 
affectionate  Father,  and  ourselves  only  as  the 
fondlings  of  his  regard  ;  but  Him  also  as  the  great 
moral  Teacher,  the  Lawgiver  and  moral  Governor 
of  man,  and  ourselves  in  a  state  of  pupillage  and 
probation,  or  as  the  subjects  of  a  moral  discipline. 

21.  And  here  it  may  be  proper  to  remark,  that 
we  understand  by  the  goodness  of  God,  not  His 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


313 


benevolence  or  His  kindness  alone.  The  term  is 
comprehensive  of  all  moral  excellence.  Truth  and 
justice,  and  that  strong  repugnance  to  moral  evil 
which  has  received  the  peculiar  denomination  of 
Holiness — these  are  all  good  moral  properties, 
and  so  enter  into  the  composition  of  perfect  moral 
goodness.  There  are  some  who  have  analyzed, 
oi,  in  the  mere  force  of  their  own  wishfulness, 
would  resolve  the  whole  character  of  the  Deity 
into  but  one  attribute— that  of  a  placid  undis¬ 
tinguishing  tenderness;  and,  in  virtue  of  this 
tasteful  or  sentimental  but  withal  meagre  imagi¬ 
nation,  Mould  they  despoil  Him  of  all  sovereignty 
and  of  all  sacredness— holding  Him  forth  as  but 
the  indulgent  Father,  and  not  also  as  the  righteous 
Governor  of  men.  But  this  analysis  is  as  im¬ 
practicable  in  the  character  of  God,  as  we  have 
already  found  it  to  be  in  the  character  of  man.* 
Unsophisticated  conscience  speaks  differently. 
The  forebodings  of  the  human  spirit  in  regard  to 
futurity,  as  well  as  the  present  phenomena  of 
human  life,  point  to  truth  and  righteousness,  as 
distinct  and  stable  and  independent  perfections  of 
the  divine  nature — hoM^ever  glossed  or  disguised 
they  may  have  been,  by  the  patrons  of  a  mild  and 
easy  religion.  In  the  various  provisions  of  nature 
for  the  defence  and  security  of  the  inferior  animals, 
we  may  read  but  one  lesson — the  benevolence  of 
its  Author.  In  the  like  provisions,  M'hether  for 
the  defence  and  prolongation  of  human  life,  or  the 
maintenance  of  human  society — we  read  that  lesson 

See  Natural  Theology,  Book  iv.  Chap.  iv.  §  7. 

VOL,  V,  "  Q 


314  FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 

too,  but  other  lessons  in  conjunction  with  it.  For 
in  the  larger  capacities  of  man,  and  more  espe¬ 
cially  in  his  possession  of  a  moral  nature,  do  we 
regard  him  as  born  for  something  ulterior  and 
something  higher  than  the  passing  enjoyments  of 
a  brief  and  ephemeral  existence.  And  so  when 
we  witness  in  the  provisions,  whether  of  his  ani¬ 
mal  or  mental  economy,  a  subserviency  to  the 
protection,  or  even  to  the  enjoyments  of  his  transi¬ 
tion  state — we  cannot  disconnect  this  with  subser¬ 
viency  to  the  remoter  objects  of  that  ultimate  state 
whither  he  is  going.  In  the  instinctive  fondness 
of  parents,  and  the  affinities  of  kindness  from  the 
fellows  of  our  species,  and  even  the  private  affec¬ 
tions  of  anger  and  fear, — we  behold  so  many 
elements  conjoined  into  what  may  be  termed  an  ap¬ 
paratus  of  guardianship,  and  such  an  apparatus  has 
been  reared  by  Providence  in  behalf  of  every 
creature  that  breathes.  But  in  the  case  of  man, 
with  his  larger  capacities  and  prospects,  the  termi¬ 
nating  object,  even  of  such  an  intermediate  and 
temporary  apparatus,  is  not  to  secure  for  him 
the  safety  or  happiness  of  the  present  life.  It  is 
to  fulfil  the  period  and  subserve  the  purposes  of  a 
moral  discipline.  For  meanwhile  character  is 
ripening;  and,  whether  good  or  bad,  settling  by 
the  power  and  operation  of  habit  into  a  state 
of  inveteracy — and  so  as  to  fix  and  prepare  the 
disciples  of  a  probationary  state  for  their  final 
destinations.  What  to  the  inferior  animals  are 
the  provisions  of  a  life,  are  to  man  the  accommoda¬ 
tions  of  a  journey.  In  the  one  we  singly  behold 
the  indications  of  a  divine  benevolence.  With 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  315 

the  other,  vve  connect  the  purposes  of  a  divine 
administration ;  and,  beside  the  love  and  liberality 
of  a  Parent,  we  recognise  the  designs  of  a 
Teacher,  and  Governor,  and  Judge. 

22.  And  these  special  affections,  though  their 
present  and  more  conspicuous  use  be  to  uphold 
the  existing  economy  of  life,  are  not  without  their 
influence  and  their  uses  in  a  system  of  moral  dis¬ 
cipline.  And  it  is  quite  obvious,  that,  ere  we  can 
pronounce  on  the  strict  and  essential  virtuousness 
of  any  human  being,  they  must  be  admitted  into 
the  reckoning.  In  estimating  the  precise  moral 
quality  of  any  beneficence,  which  man  may  have 
executed,  it  is  indispensable  to  know,  in  how  far 
he  was  schooled  into  it  at  the  bidding  of  principle, 
and  in  how  far  urged  forward  to  it  by  the  impulse 
of  a  special  affection.  To  do  good  to  another 
because  he  feels  that  he  ought,  is  an  essentially 
distinct  exhibition  from  doing  the  same  good  by 
the  force  of  parental  love,  or  of  an  instinctive  and 
spontaneous  compassion— as  distinct  as  the  strength 
of  a  constitutionally  implanted  desire  is  from  the 
sense  of  a  morally  incumbent  obligation.  In  as 
far  as  I  am  prompted  to  the  relief  of  distress  by  a 
movement  of  natural  pity— in  so  far  less  is  left  for 
virtue  to  do.  In  as  far  as  I  am  restrained  from 
the  outbreakings  of  an  anger  which  tumultuates 
within,  by  the  dread  of  a  counter-resentment  and 
retaliation  from  without — in  so  far  virtue  has  less 
to  resist.  It  is  thus  that  the  special  affections 
may  at  once  lighten  the  tasks  and  lessen  the 
temptations  of  virtue ;  and,  whether  in  the  w'ay  of 
help  at  one  time  or  of  defence  at  another,  may 


316  FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 

save  the  very  existence  of  a  principle,  which  in  its 
own  unaided  frailty,  rftight,  among  the  rude  conflicts 
of  life,  have  else  been  overborne.  It  is  perhaps  indis¬ 
pensable  to  the  very  being  of  virtue  among  men, 
that,  by  means  of  the  special  affections,  a  certain 
force  of  inclination  has  been  superadded  to  the 
force  of  principle — we  doubt  not,  in  proportions  of 
highest  wisdom,  of  most  exquisite  skill  and  deli¬ 
cacy.  But  still  the  strength  of  the  one  must  be 
deducted,  in  computing  the  real  amount  and 
strength  of  the  other ;  and  so  the  special  affections 
of  our  nature  not  only  subserve  a  purpose  in  time, 
but  are  of  essential  and  intimate  effect  in  the 
processes  of  our  moral  preparation,  and  will 
eventually  tell  on  the  high  retributions  and  judg¬ 
ments  ef  eternity. 

23.  Man  is  not  a  utilitarian  either  in  his  pro¬ 
pensities  or  in  his  principles.  When  doing  what 
he  likes — it  is  not  always,  it  is  not  generally, 
because  of  its  perceived  usefulness,  that  he  so 
likes  it.  But  his  inclinations,  these  properties  of 
his  nature,  have  been  so  adapted  both  to  the 
material  world  and  to  human  society,  that  a  great 
accompanying  or  great  resulting  usefulness,  is  the 
effect  of  that  particular  constitution  which  God 
hath  given  to  him.  And  when  doing  what  he 
feels  that  he  ought,  it  is  far  from  always  because 
of  its  perceived  usefulness,  that  he  so  feels.  But 
God  hath  so  formed  our  mental  constitution,  and 
hath  so  adapted  the  whole  economy  of  external 
things  to  the  stable  and  everlasting  principles  of 
virtue,  that,  in  effect  and  historical  fulfilment,  the 
greatest  virtue  and  the  greatest  happiness  are  at 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  317 


me.  But  the  union  of  these  two  does  not  con¬ 
stitute  their  unity.  Virtue  is  not  right  because  it 
is  useful ;  but  God  hath  made  it  useful,  because  it 
is  right.  He  both  loves  virtue,  and  wills  the 
happiness  of  His  creatures — this  benevolence  of 
will  being  itself,  not  the  whole,  but  one  of  the 
brightest  moralities  in  the*  character  of  the  God¬ 
head.  He  wills  the  happiness  of  man  but  wills 
his  virtue  more ;  and  accordingly  hath  so  con¬ 
structed  both  the  system  of  humanity,  and  the 
system  of  external  nature,  that  only  through  the 
medium  of  virtue  can  any  substantial  or  lasting 
happiness  be  realized.  The  utilitarians  have 
conlounded  these  two  elements,  because  of  the 
inseparable  yet  contingent  alliance  which  a  God 
of  virtue  hath  established  between  them.  The 
cosmopolites  are  for  merging  all  the  particular 
affections  into  one,  and  would  substitute  in  their 
place  a  general  desire  for  the  greatest  possible 
amount  of  good  to  others,  as  the  alone  guide  and 
impellent  of  human  conduct.  And  the  utilitarians 
are  for  merging  all  the  particular  virtues  into  one; 
and  would  substitute  in  their  place  the  greatest 
usefulness,  as  the  alone  principle  to  which  every 
question  respecting  the  morality  of  actions  should 
be  referred.  The  former  would  do  away  friend¬ 
ship,  and  patriotism,  and  all  the  partialities  or 
even  instincts  of  relationship,  from  the  system  of 
human  nature.  The  latter  would  at  least  degrade, 
if  not  do  away,  with  truth  and  justice  from  the 
place  which  they  now  hold  in  the  system  of  Ethics. 
The  desolating  effect  of  such  changes,  on  the 
happiness  and  security  of  social  life,  would  exhibit 


318 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


the  vast  superiority  of  the  existent  economy  of 
things,  over  that  speculative  economy  into  which 
these  theories  would  transform  it ;  or,  in  other 
words,  would  prove  by  how  mighty  an  interval 
the  goodness  and  the  wisdom  of  God  transcended 
both  the  goodness  and  the  wisdom  of  man. 

24.  The  whole  of  this  speculation,  if  followed 
out  into  its  just  and  legitimate  consequences,  would 
serve  greatly  to  humble  and  reduce  our  estimate 
of  human  virtue.  Nothing  is  virtuous  but  what 
is  done  under  a  sense  of  duty;  or  done,  simply 
and  solely  because  it  ought.  It  is  only  in  as  far 
as  this  consideration  is  present  to  the  mind,  and  is 
of  practical  and  prevalent  operation  there — that 
man  can  be  said  to  feel  virtuously,  or  to  act  virtu¬ 
ously.  We  should  not  think  of  affixing  this  moral 
characteristic  to  any  perfoi’mance,  however  bene¬ 
ficial,  that  is  done  under  the  mere  impulse  of  a 
headlong  sensibility,  without  any  sense  or  any 
sentiment  of  a  moral  obligation.  In  every  good 
action,  that  is  named  good  because  useful  to 
society,  we  should  subduct  or  separate  all  which  is 
due  to  the  force  of  a  special  affection,  that  we 
might  precisely  ascertain  how  much  or  how  little 
remains,  which  may  be  due  to  the  force  of  principle. 
T'he  inferior  animals,  destitute  though  they  be  of 
a  moral  nature,  and  therefore  incapable  of  virtue, 
share  with  us  in  some  of  the  most  useful  and 
amiable  instincts  which  belong  to  humanity ;  and 
when  w'e  stop  to  admire  the  workings  of  nature’s 
sensibility — whether  in  the  tears  that  compassion 
sheds  over  the  miseries  of  the  unfortunate,  or  in 
the  smiles  and  endearments  lavished  by  a  mother 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  319 


opon  her  infant  family— we  seldom  reflect  how 
little  of  the  real  and  proper  character  of  virtue  is 
there*  e  accredit  man  as  if  they  were  his  own 
principles,  with  those  instincts  which  the  Divinity 
hath  implanted  within  him ;  and  it  aggravates  the 
error,  or  rather  the  guilt  of  so  perverse  a  reckon- 
while  we  offer  this  incense  to  humanity, 
we  forget  all  the  while  the  hand  of  Him  by  whom 
it  is  that  humanity  is  so  bountifully  gifted  and  so 
beauteously  adorned. 

25.  But  after  all,  it  is  in  the  felt  supremacy  of 
conscience,  more  than  either  in  the  useful  affec¬ 
tions  of  our  nature  or  in  the  useful  arrangements 
of  the  external  world,  that  we  read  in  most  un¬ 
equivocal  characters  of  the  moral  rectitude  of  Him 
who  framed  us.  Each  of  the  emotions  whereof 
our  nature  is  susceptible,  is  obviously  subservient 
to  some  good  purpose  or  other;  but  that  the 
purpose  may  be  fully  gained,  or  gained  without 
the  alloy  of  any  evil,  the  emotion  should  neither 
be  in  defect  nor  in  excess  -;  or,  in  other  words,  it 
should,  if  in  defect  when  left  to  its  own  spontane¬ 
ous  workings,  be  urged  forward  to  a  certain  point; 
or,  if  in  excess,  it  should  be  restrained  from  pass- 
ing  beyond  it.  Now,  for  performing  the  office  of 
this  regulation,  conscience  is  the  regulating  faculty, 
which,  by  acting  on  the  wull,  and  so  issuing  forth 
its  commands  on  the  attention,  can  so  far  bring 
the  emotions  under  the  authority  of  the  mind’s 
own  bidding,  and  thus  retain  and  employ,  as 
ministers  for  good,  those  affections  which,  if  left 
to  their  own  random  and  reckless  operation, 
might  have  been  ministers  for  evil.  It  is  thus 


320 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


that  anger,  and  fear,  and  grief,  and  compassion, 
and  even  ambition  and  avarice,  might  serve  as 
auxiliaries  to  virtue  or  impellents  for  the  more 
sure  and  vigorous  execution  of  its  dictates — 
because,  through  this  intermediate  machinery  of  the 
attention  and  the  vrill,  they  might  all  be  brought 
under  the  dominion  of  that  faculty,  which  tells 
of  righteousness  and  of  its  supreme  obligation. 
It  is  the  governance  that  has  been  assigned  to  this 
faculty,  in  the  very  make  and  structure  of  our 
minds,  which,  more  than  any  thing  else  in  the 
whole  compass  of  nature,  announces  of  the  God 
who  placed  it  there,  that  He  is  indeed  a  righte¬ 
ous  governor.  And  the  conclusion  is  greatly 
enhanced,  when,  on  examining  farther  into  the 
constitution  of  man,  we  find,  that,  not  only  are  our 
states  of  emotion  as  the  sensibilities  of  the  heart 
subject  by  means  of  the  attention  and  the  will  to 
the  regulation  of  the  conscience ;  but  that,  by  the 
same  stepping-stones,  conscience  has  also  a  con¬ 
trol  over  our  intellectual  states,  or  is  of  powerful 
influence  in  determining  the  views  and  opinions  of 
the  understanding. 

26.  If  certain  parts  in  the  machinery  of  a  watch 
were  so  placed,  and  had  withal  such  forces  con¬ 
ferred  on  them,  as  to  overbear  the  regulator — this 
would  cast  an  obscuration  over  the  design  of  the 
mechanism,  and  do  away  the  conclusion  that  it 
was  formed  for  the  purpose  of  moving  regularly. 
And  the  same  is  true  of  our  own  mental  constitu¬ 
tion.  If  certain  parts  and  faculties,  from  the  very 
position  or  tendency  which  has  been  originally 
assigned  to  them,  destroyed  the  control  which 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


321 


conscience  might  otherwise  have  had  as  the  over¬ 
ruling  faculty  of  our  nature,  this  might  obscure  or 
rather  nullify  the  inference  that  man  was  made  for 
the  purpose  of  walking  conscientiously ;  and  so 
make  him  unfit  for  being  appealed  to  as  evidence 
for  the  moral  character  or  designs  of  his  Creator. 
We  all  know  how  much  the  conduct  of  man  is 
influenced  by  the  views  of  his  understanding  ;  and 
with  what  power  the  emotions  act  as  so  many 
impefient  forces,  in  giving  both  direction  and 
celerity  to  his  movements.  If  then  opinion  were 
so  much  the  fruit  of  an  organic  necessity,  that  even 
the  desire  of  truth  formed  no  guarantee  against 
perversity  and  error;  or  if  the  various  affections  of 
which  man  is  susceptible,  were  so  many  headlong 
propensities,  against  the  excess  or  deficiency  of 
which  no  provision  ever  had  been  made  in  the 
framework  of  our  moral  nature,  so  as  that  the 
sense  of  duty  might  be  brought  efficiently  to  bear 
upon  them — this  might  altogether  frustrate  the 
conclusion,  that,  from  the  relation  of  his  various 
faculties  and  feelings,  from  the  very  way  in  which 
they  have  been  put  together,  man  at  the  first  must 
have  been  framed  by  the  fingers  of  a  righteous 
God.  This  conclusion,  on  the  other  hand,  will  be 
saved,  if  it  can  be  demonstrated  that  in  the  original 
structure  of  humanity  there  is  no  such  maladjust¬ 
ment  ;  if,  as  the  will  is  obviously  at  the  bidding  of 
the  conscience,  it  can  furthermore  be  shown  in  how 
far  the  emotions  and  the  understanding  are  at  the 
bidding  of  the  will.  On  this  question  it  will  de¬ 
pend  whether  man,  in  the  common  meaning  of  the 
term,  is  necessarily  bereft  of  all  control  over 

o  2 


322  FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMO'!  IONS. 

either  his  intellectual  state,  or  states  of  emotion  ; 
or  whether  rather,  it  be  not  his  own  fault  that  he 
is  the  victim  either  of  perverse  judgments  or  head¬ 
long  propensities. 

27.  There  is  then  another  application  of  at 
least  as  high  importance,  to  which  this  peculiaritv 
of  our  mental  structure  is  subservient.  By  th.c 
command  which  the  will  has  over  the  attention, 
we  become  responsible,  not  only  for  our  states  of 
emotion,  but  also  in  a  great  degree  for  our  intel¬ 
lectual  states.  The  imairination  that  there  is 
neither  moral  worth  nor  moral  delinquency  in  the 
state  of  a  man’s  belief,  proceeds  on  the  voluntary 
having  had  no  share  in  the  process  which  leads  to 
it.  Now,  through  the  intermedium  of  the  very 
same  faculty,  the  faculty  of  attention,  the  will 
stands  related  to  the  ultimate  convictions  of  the 
understanding,  precisely  as  it  stands  related  to  the 
ultimate  emotions  of  the  heart.  It  is  true  that  as 
the  object  in  view  of  the  mind  is,  so  the  emotion 
is.  And  it  is  as  true  that  as  the  evidence  in  view 
of  the  mind  is,  so  the  belief  is.  In  neither  case 
has  the  will  to  do  with  the  concluding  sequence ; 
but  in  both  cases  it  has  equally  to  do  with  the 
sequences  that  went  before  it.  There  may  be  a 
pathological  necessity  beyond  our  control,  in  that 
final  step  of  the  succession,  which  connects  the 
object  that  is  perceived  with  its  counterpart  emo¬ 
tion,  or  the  evidence  that  is  perceived  with  its 
counterpart  belief.  But  in  like  manner  as  it  is  by 
the  attention,  which  we  might  or  might  not  have 
exercised,  that  the  evidence  is  perceived  by  us,  so 
is  it  by  the  attention,  which  we  might  or  might 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 


323 


not  have  exercised,  that  the  evidence  is  perceived 
by  us.  It  is  thus  that  on  innumerable  questions, 
and  these  of  vital  importance,  both  to  the  present 
well-being  and  the  future  prospects  of  humanity, 
the  moral  may  have  had  causal  antecedency  over 
the  intellectual ;  and  the  state  of  a  man’s  creed 
may  depend  on  the  prior  state  of  his  character. 
We  have  already  seen  how  a  present  compassion 
may  have  been  the  result  of  a  previous  choice ; 
and  so  may  a  present  conviction  be  the  result  of  a 
previous  choice — being  in  proportion,  not  to  the 
evidence  possessed  by  the  subject,  but  to  the 
evidence  attended  to,  and  perceived  in  consequence 
of  that  attention.  The  designations  of  virtuous 
and  vicious  are  only  applicable  to  that  which  is 
voluntary;  and  it  is  precisely  because,  through 
the  faculty  of  attention,  the  voluntary  has  had  so 
much  to  do,  if  not  immediately  with  the  belief,  at 
least  with  the  investigations  which  lead  to  it — that 
man  may  be  reckoned  with  for  the  judgments  of 
his  understanding,  as  well  as  for  the  emotions  of 
his  heart  or  the  actions  of  his  history. 

28.  That  man  is  not  rightfully  the  subject  of 
any  moral  reckoning  for  his  belief,  would  appear, 
then,  to  be  as  monstrous  a  heresy  in  science  as  it 
is  in  theology,  as  philosophically  unsound  as  it  is 
religiously  unsound ;  and  deriving  all  its  plausibility 
from  the  imagination,  that  the  belief  is  in  no  way 
dependent  upon  the  will.  It  is  not  morally  incum¬ 
bent  upon  man  to  see  an  object  which  is  placed 
beyond  the  sphere  of  his  vision — nor  can  either  a 
rightful  condemnation  or  a  rightful  vengeance  be 
.aid  upon  him,  because  he  has  not  perceived  it. 


324  flNAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS, 

It  must  He  within  that  sphere,  else  he  is  no  more 
responsible  for  not  having  reached  it  with  his  eye, 
than  for  not  having  stretched  forth  his  hand  to 
any  of  the  distant  bodies  of  the  firmament.  It 
must  be  within  range  of  his  seeing ;  and  then  the 
only  question  which  needs  to  be  resolved  is,  what 
the  will  has  to  do  with  the  seeing  of  it.  Now  to 
see  is  not  properly  an  act  of  the  will,  but  to  look 
is  altogether  so  ;  and  it  is  the  dependence  of  his 
looking  faculty  on  the  will,  which  makes  man 
responsible  for  what  he  sees  or  what  he  does  not 
see,  in  reference  to  all  those  objects  of  sight,  that 
are  placed  Avithin  the  territory  of  sensible  vision. 
And  if  there  be  but  a  looking  faculty  in  the  mind, 
man  may  be  alike  responsible  for  w^hat  he  believes 
or  what  he  does  not  believe,  in  reference,  not  to 
sensible  objects  alone,  but  to  those  truths  which 
are  placed  within  the  territory  of  his  intellectual 
or  mental  vision.  Now  attention  is  even  such  a 
faculty.  Man  can  turn  and  transfer  it  at  pleasure 
from  one  to  another  topic  of  contemplation.  He 
can  take  cognizance  of  any  visible  thing,  in  virtue 
of  the  power  which  he  has  over  the  eye  of  his  body 
— a  power,  not  to  alter  the  laws  of  vision,  but  to 
bring  the  organ  of  vision  within  the  operation  of 
these  laws.  And  he  can  take  cognizance  of  any 
announced  truth,  in  virtue  of  the  power  he  has 
over  the  attention,  which  is  his  mental  eye — a 
power,  not  to  alter  the  laws  of  evidence,  but  to 
bring  the  organ  of  the  intellect  within  their  opera¬ 
tion.  Attention  is  the  locking  organ  of  the  mind 
— the  link  of  communication  between  man’s  moral 
and  man’s  intellectual  nature — the  messenger,  as 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  325 

it  were,  by  which  the  interchange  between  these 
two  departments  is  carried  on — a  messenger  too  at 
the  bidding  of  the  will,  who  saith  to  it  at  one  time 
go  and  it  goeth,  at  another  come  and  it  cometh, 
and  at  a  third  do  this  and  it  doeth  it.  It  is  thus 
that  man  becomes  directly  responsible  for  the  con¬ 
clusions  of  his  understanding — for  these  conclusions 
depend  altogether,  not  on  the  evidence  which  exists, 
but  on  that  portion  of  the  evidence  which  is  attended 
to.  He  is  not  to  be  reckoned  with,  either  for  the 
lack  or  the  sufficiency,  of  the  existent  evidence ; 
but  he  might  most  justly  be  reckoned  with,  for  the 
lack  or  the  sufficiency  of  his  attention.  It  is  not 
for  him  to  create  the  light  of  day;  but  it  is  for  him 
both  to  open  and  to  present  his  eye  to  all  its  mani¬ 
festations.  Neither  is  it  for  him  to  fetch  down  to 
earth  the  light  of  the  upper  sanctuary.  But  if  it 
be  indeed  true  that  that  light  hath  come  into  the 
world ;  then  it  is  for  him  to  guide  the  eye  of  his 
understanding  towards  it.  There  is  a  voluntary 
part  for  him  to  perform,  and  thenceforward  the 
question  is  involved  with  most  obvious  moralities. 
The  thing  is  now  submitted  to  his  choice.  He  may 
have  the  light,  if  he  only  love  the  light ;  and  if  he 
do  not,  then  are  his  love  of  darkness  and  the  evil 
of  his  doings,  the  unquestionable  grounds  of  his 
most  clear  and  emphatic  condemnation. 

29.  And  this  principle  is  of  force,  throughout 
all  the  stages  in  the  process  of  the  inquiry — from 
the  very  first  glance  of  that  which  is  the  subject  of 
it,  to  the  full  and  finished  conviction  in  which  the 
inquiry  terminates.  At  the  commencement  of 
the  process,  we  may  see  nothing  but  the  likeli- 


326  FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS. 

hoods  of  a  subject — not  the  conclusive  proofs,  but 
only  as  yet  the  dim  and  dawning  probabilities  of 
the  question — nothing  which  is  imperative  on  our 
belief,  and  yet  every  thing  which  is  imperative  upon 
our  attention.  There  may  be  as  great  a  moral 
perversity  in  resisting  that  call,  v/hich  the  mere 
semblance  of  truth  makes  upon  our  further  atten¬ 
tion — as  in  resisting  that  call,  which  the  broad 
and  perfect  manifestation  of  it  makes  upon  our 
conviction.  In  the  practice  of  Scottish  law, 
there  is  a  distinction  made  between  the  precogni¬ 
tion  and  the  proof — carried  into  effect  in  England 
by  the  respective  functions  of  the  grand  and 
petty  jury ;  it  being  the  office  of  the  former  to  find 
a  true  bill,  or  to  decide  whether  the  matter 
in  question  should  be  brought  to  a  further  trial ; 
and  it  being  the  office  of  the  latter  to  make  that 
trial,  and  to  pronounce  the  final  verdict  there¬ 
upon.  Now  what  we  affirm  is,  that  there  might 
be  to  the  full  as  grievous  a  delinquency  in  the 
former  act  of  judgment  as  in  the  latter;  in  the 
denial  of  a  further  hearing  to  the  cause  after  the 
strong  probabilities  which  have  transpired  at  the 
one  stage,  as  in  the  denial  of  a  fair  verdict  after 
the  strong  and  satisfactory  proofs  which  have 
transpired  at  the  other.  All  the  equities  of  recti¬ 
tude  may  be  as  much  traversed  or  violated,  at  the 
initial  or  progressive  steps  of  such  an  inquiry,  as 
by  the  ultimate  judgment  vffiich  forms  the  termi¬ 
nation  of  it.  To  resist  a  good  and  valid  precogni¬ 
tion,  and  so  to  refuse  the  trial,  is  a  moral  unfair¬ 
ness  of  the  very  same  kind,  with  that  resistance  of 
a  good  and  valid  proof  which  leads  to  the  utter- 


FINAL  CAUSES  OF  THE  EMOTIONS.  327 

ance  of  a  false  verdict.  He  were  an  iniquitous 
judge  who  should  internally  stifle  the  impression 
of  those  verities,  which  now  brightened  forth  upon 
him  at  the  close  of  his  investigation.  But  he  also 
were  an  iniquitous  judge,  who  should  stifle  the 
impression  of  those  verisimilitudes,  that  even  but 
obscurely  and  languidly  beamed  upon  him  at  the 
outset. 

31.  Now,  in  all  the  processes  of  the  human 
intellect,  there  is  a  similar  gradation  silently  yet 
substantially  carried  forward.  There  is  first  an 
aspect  of  probability,  which  constitutes  no  claim 
upon  our  immediate  belief,  but  which  at  least 
constitutes  a  most  rightful  claim  upon  our  atten¬ 
tion,  a  faculty,  as  we  before  said,  at  the  bidding 
of  our  will,  and  for  the  exercise  of  which  we  are 
therefore  responsible — seeing  that  whenever  there 
is  a  rightful  claim  upon  our  attention,  and  the 
attention  is  not  given,  it  is  wrongously  withheld. 
But  we  know  that  the  effect  of  this  faculty,  is  to 
brighten  every  object  of  contemplation  to  which  it 
is  directed,  gradually  to  evolve  into  greater  clear¬ 
ness  all  its  lineaments,  and  lastly  to  impress  the 
right  conviction  upon  the  understanding.  In 
other  words,  the  man,  on  such  an  occasion  as  this, 
is  intellectually  right,  but  just  because  he  is 
morally  right.  He  becomes  sound  in  faith  ;  but 
only  in  virtue  of  having  become  sound  in  princi¬ 
ple.  The  true  belief  in  which  he  ultimately  lands, 
is  not  all  at  once  forced  upon  him,  by  the  creden¬ 
tials  wherewith  it  was  associated ;  but  he  had  the 
patience  and  the  candour  to  wait  the  unrolling  of 
these  credentials ;  or  rather  he  helped  to  unrol  _ 


328  PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE. 

them  with  his  own  hand.  He  fastened  his  regards 
upon  some  proposition  which  involved  in  it  the 
interests  or  the  obligations  of  humanity ;  because 
there  sat  upon  it  even  at  the  first,  a  certain  credi¬ 
table  aspect,  which  had  he  had  the  hardihood  to 
withstand  or  to  turn  from,  it  would  have  made  him 
chargeable,  not  with  a  mental  alone,  but  with  a 
moral  perversity — not  with  the  error  that  springs 
from  a  mistaken  judgment,  but  with  the  guilt  that 
springs  from  the  violation  of  an  incumbent  duty. 
Many  are  the  truths  which  do  not  carry  an  instant 
and  overpowering  evidence  along  with  them ;  and 
which  therefore,  at  their  first  announcement,  are 
not  entitled  to  demand  admittance  for  themselves 
as  the  articles  of  a  creed.  Nevertheless  they  may 
be  entitled  to  a  hearing;  and,  by  the  refusal  of 
that  hearing,  man  incurs,  not  the  misfortune  of  an 
involuntary  blunder,  but  the  turpitude  of  a  volun¬ 
tary  crime. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

On  the  Phenomena  of  Anger  and  Gratitude,  and 
the  Moral  Theory  ivhich  has  been  grounded 
upon  them. 

1.  The  emotion  of  anger  is  doubtless  one  of  very 
frequent  experience,  and  is  at  times  felt  so  intensely, 
as  to  engrave  itself  deeply  on  the  consciousness — ■ 
So  that  the  faithful  picture  which  is  given  of  it  by 
one  man,  may  very  easily  be  recognised  by  another 


PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE.  329 


and  it  is  not  the  less  favourable  for  our  purpose, 
that  it  so  distinctly  announces  to  us  its  leading  char¬ 
acteristics,  by  the  tone  and  the  countenance  and 
the  gesticulations  of  others  beside  ourselves.  Nay, 
it  seems  to  widen  the  field  of  observation,  and 
perhaps  to  suggest  some  important  distinction, 
that  it  is  an  emotion  shared  with  us  by  the  inte¬ 
rior  animals.  There  is  often  much  of  a  moral 
feeling  blended  with  this  emotion  in  man ;  and  it 
is  interesting  to  perceive  it,  in  its  merely  animal 
displays  among  the  inferior  tribes  of  living  crea¬ 
tures — leading  many  to  apprehend  that,  as  there 
may  often  be  detected  in  beasts  the  rudiments  of 
an  understanding,  so  there  may  also  be  detected 
something  like  the  embryo  of  a  moral  nature — the 
rude  elements  of  justice  at  play  in  the  very  growl 
and  ferociousness  of  a  wolf  or  of  a  tiger,  that, 
when  cheated  of  its  desires  and  expectations,  seems 
to  feel  as  if  bereft  of  its  rights;  and,  in  the  outcries 
of  its  disappointment,  to  vent  forth  somewhat  like 
a  proclamation  of  its  wrongs. 

2.  A  lioness  robbed  of  her  whelps  causeth  the 
desert  to  ring  with  an  appeal,  that  hath  in  it,  one 
might  imagine,  the  tone  of  a  demand  for  justice ; 
and  is  as  emphatically  felt  to  be  such  by  him  who 
hears  it,  as  if  it  came  to  him  in  the  vehicle  of  arti¬ 
culate  language.  The  noble  creature  seems  to 
feel  and  to  understand  morality.  Ihere  is  an 
eloquence  in  the  complaint  of  an  outraged  animal, 
that,  at  least,  stirs  up  the  elements  of  moral  feel¬ 
ing  in  man,  and  inclines  him  to  the  redress  of  its 
Injuries— and  the  animal  itself  seems  as  if  really 
actuated  by  a  sense  oi  these  injuries,  and  as  if 


330  phenomena  of  anger  and  gratitude. 

really  pleading  for  redress.  This  might  have  led 
some  to  apprehend  a  strong  alliance,  at  least, 
between  the  emotion  of  anger  and  a  sense  of  injury; 
and  so  as  to  imagine,  that,  if  they  cleaidy  deline¬ 
ated  the  phenomena  of  anger,  this  might  serve  as 
a  stepping-stone,  by  which  to  come  at  a  right 
understanding  of  the  nature  of  justice.  And,  as 
a  proof  that  anger  has  more  to  do  with  justice 
than  the  other  emotions  have — had  the  lioness 
been  bereft  of  her  young  by  the  falling  in  of  the 
roof  of  her  cave,  that  overwhelmed  her  whole 
family  in  destruction  while  she  herself  had  escaped 
from  it,  there  "would  have  been  the  agony  of  grief. 
Had  she  been  bereft  of  them  by  a  tiger  that  stole 
them  away,  by  its  own  secret  and  unknown  path, 
to  the  top  of  an  else  inaccessible  precipice ;  and 
there  visibly  devoured  them  before  her  eyes,  there 
would  have  been  the  fire  and  fury  of  resentment. 
No  one  of  course  has  witnessed  either  of  these 
exhibitions ;  yet  we  are  persuaded,  that,  to  this 
difference  of  the  two  events,  there  would  be  a  cor¬ 
respondent  difference  of  tone  and  expression,  on 
the  part  of  the  savage  untamed  creature,  who  had 
been  subjected  to  them — that,  on  the  former  event, 
its  cry  would  have  in  it  more  of  a  soft  and  pathetic 
tenderness ;  and  that,  on  the  latter  event,  there 
would  be  a  fell  and  a  fierce  vindictiveness  in  its 
cry.  Here  there  are  two  emotions  that  might  be 
looked  to  apart  from  each  other,  as  having  dis¬ 
tinct  characters ;  and  that  might  also  be  referred 
to  their  distinct  causes.  More  especially  might 
we  feel  ourselves  authorized  to  say,  that,  in  the 
above  instance,  the  anger  is  felt,  because  there  is 


PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE.  331 

the  belief  that  the  harm  had  been  inflicted  by  means 
of  some  living  creature  ;  that  the  proper  object  of 
this  emotion  is  a  creature  which  has  life ;  that 
when  the  same  material  hurt  is  sustained  by  an 
external  cause,  in  which  nothing  with  life  had  any 
concern,  there  is  still  an  emotion,  but  an  emotion 
altogether  distinct  from  anger ;  and  thus,  though 
there  may  both  be  a  regret  and  a  resentment  felt 
under  one  and  the  same  visitation,  yet  we  both  in 
the  nature  and  the  exercise  of  these  two  feelings, 
have  room  for  that  very  discrimination  by  which 
emotion  is  performed. 

3.  This  belief  that  the  harm  was  inflicted  by  a 
living  creature,  might  be  a  mere  delusive  imagina-  - 
tion — and  it  is  just  an  exhibition  of  the  same  phe¬ 
nomena,  though  the  anger  should  be  felt  and 
should  operate  as  before.  The  dog  which  barks 
at  the  man  of  straw,  whose  garments  fluctuate  in 
the  wind,  and  afterwards  ceases  from  the  habit  alto¬ 
gether,  still  proves  that  his  irritation  was  excited 
by  the  thought  of  a  living  creature  ;  and  with  whom 
perhaps  he  associated,  if  not  the  actual  infliction, 
at  least  the  probability  of  future  harm.  His  attack 
upon  a  hedgehog  exemplifies  the  law  of  this  emo¬ 
tion.  At  his  first  onset  there  is  the  imagination 
of  a  living  creature — and  the  wrath  by  which  he 
was  then  actuated  is  heightened  in  a  moment  to 
exasperation,  when  he  is  made  to  suffer  the  pains 
of  a  collision  with  it— till  by  its  remaining  long 
immoveable,  the  belief  seems  to  die  away  of  its 
being  really  animated.  But  if  after  the  contest 
has  been  suspended,  it  should  at  length  move  and 
announce  to  its  observant  enemy  that  life  and  sensi- 


332  phenomena  of  anger  and  gratitude. 

bility  are  within,  then,  as  if  presented  anew  with 
the  appropriate  object  for  the  excitement  of  an^er, 
is  this  feeling  again  excited  as  at  the  first,  and 
discharges  itself  as  before  on  the  unhappy  object 
of  it.  And  there  is  often  an  efficacy  in  extreme 
passion,  so  to  heat  and  to  hurry  the  imagination, 
as  actually  to  transport  the  mind  into  the  momen¬ 
tary  belief  of  a  living  principle,  when  in  truth  there 
is  none,  and  thus  to  uphold  and  divert  anger  .for  a 
time  towards  an  object  that  is  not  properly  or  ori¬ 
ginally  suited  to  it — as  when  a  man  turns  round 
to  curse  the  stone  against  which  his  foot  hath 
struck  itself  painfully — or  as  when  he  tears  the 
letter  into  fragments,  by  which  its  w  riter  hath  ago¬ 
nized  or  insulted  him ;  or,  to  descend,  again  for 
instances  among  the  lower  animals,  as  when  the 
infuriated  bull  hath  missed  the  object  of  his  pursuit, 
and  gores  and  treads  upon  the  mantle  that  was 
dropt  in  the  flight.  Such  is  the  blindness  of  rage, 
that  whatever  it  meets  with  seems  to  be  personi¬ 
fied.  But  these  are  the  devious  phenomena  of  the 
emotion;  and  are  capable  of  being  so  explained, 
as  to  leave  the  general  proposition  unaffected — that 
from  life  it  is,  that  the  provocative  strictly  comes, 
and  on  life  it  is  that  the  provocation  is  wreaked 
back  again.* 

*  It  is  of  importance  in  this  matter  to  discriminate  between  the 
object  of  the  emotion  in  its  proper  state,  and  the  object  of  it  in 
its  strange  and  capricious  deviations.  It  is  exceedingly  difficult 
to  account  fully  for  these  deviations.  We  do  not  think  it  suffi¬ 
ciently  accounted  for  by  the  mere  personihcation  of  the  inanimate 
object,  when  we  turn  round  and  wreak  our  imprecations  upon  it. 
"We  may  give  a  child  some  credit  for  this — when  it  feels  itself 
soothed  and  gratified,  by  the  blows  which  are  inflicted  on  the 
floor,  or  any  article  of  furniture  against  which  it  hath  fallen. 


PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE.  333 

4.  But  from  other  instances  it  will  appear,  that 
the  provocation  to  anger  may  come  from  one 
quarter ;  and  the  provocation  that  is  of  consequence 
felt,  instead  of  returning  back  in  the  same  direc¬ 
tion,  may  be  discharged  in  another  quarter.  We 
are  not  speaking  of  the  justice  or  the  injustice  of 
this.  We  are  speaking  of  the  fact;  and  we  might 
allege  a  thousand  exemplifications  of  it.  The 
lioness  that  had  just  witnessed  the  spectacle  of  her 
slaughtered  and  devoured  young,  would  be  thereby 
thrown  into  a  wild  general  and  undirected  frenzy, 
that  would  make  her  far  more  formidable  to  any 
passenger  that  she  should  meet  upon  her  way ; 
and,  to  satiate  her  vengeance,  might  she  strew  her 
reckless  and  infuriated  progress  with  many  inno¬ 
cent  victims.  The  ox  that  has  been  driven  to 
madness  by  his  persecutors,  if  he  had  not  the  op¬ 
portunity  of  turning  upon  them,  might  pour  out  of 
his  now  accumulated  wrath  on  the  indiscriminate 

But  we  cannot  imagine  that  man,  even  for  tlie  twinkling  of  one 
moment,  ascribes  life  or  sensibility  to  the  stone,  against  which  he 
hath  struck  his  foot  — when  he  wreaks  upon  it  the  energy  of  his  in* 
dignation.  The  only  account  which  we  can  give  of  the  pheno¬ 
mena  is  this — that  there  is  a  harmony  between  our  physical  con¬ 
stitution  and  the  laws  of  emotion  ;  that  the  one,  in  fact,  is  adapt¬ 
ed  to  subserve  the  other ;  and  the  mechanism  of  our  sentient 
nature  is  so  framed,  as  to  tally  with  those  processes  of  emotion 
which  for  wise  purposes  our  Creator  hath  established.  Thus  it 
is  that  there  is  a  promptitude  to  anger  which  often  outstrips  even 
the  rapidity  of  thought,  on  the  reception  of  a  sudden  pain ;  and  tlum 
there  is  a  relief  felt,  by  the  very  same  sort  of  discharge  which 
even  legitimate  anger  would  prompt,  and  on  which  it  too  would 
feel  itself  appeased.  It  is  this  solace  which  is  felt  upon  the 
discharge,  that  will  account  for  other  anomalies  of  conduct  under 
this  emotion.  The  activity  which  it  prompts  serves  to  relievo 
from  a  general  state  of  excitement  -just  as  a  man  can  by  giving 
himself  something  to  do,  throw  off  the  bashfulness  which  op¬ 
presses  him. 


334  PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE. 

multitude,  that  were  flying  in  every  direction  before 
him.  It  is  not  even  necessary  that  the  excitement 
should  have  been  produced  by  human  tormentors. 
The  flies  of  a  summer  day  could  raise  the  animal 
into  a  dangerous  state  of  irritability,  or  rather  of 
irritation  that  would  not  be  safe  for  any  to  encoun¬ 
ter.  And  even  man,  with  all  his  boasted  preten¬ 
sions  to  reason  and  to  equity,  may  be  convicted  of 
the  very  same  exhibition.  How  often  does  the 
injustice  of  a” few,  sour  him  into  a  misanthropy 
against  all  ?  How  often  may  he  be  seen  to  retaliate 
on  the  members  of  his  family  at  home,  the  wrongs 
and  the  vexations  that  he  may  have  met  with 
abroad?  How  often,  even  with  annovances  that 
no  living  creature  around  him  has  inflicted — the 
untoward  accidents  of  weather,  or  even  his  own 
blunders  and  mismanagements — how  often  do  these 
teaze  and  transport  him  so,  that  he  becomes  for 
the  day  a  terror  to  his  household,  who  eye  the 
storm  upon  his  brow,  and  each  trembles  apart  lest 
it  be  discharged  upon  himself?  We  have  met 
with  many  of  whom  it  has  been  said,  that  he  is  not 
in  tune  or  in  temper  just  now  ;  that  this  is  not  the 
right  season  for  approaching  him ;  and  with  whom 
it  is  just  as  necessary,  that  the  innocent,  who  have 
given  him  no  offence,  should  make  this  calculation, 
as  they  who  have  directly  injured  or  affronted  him. 
The  direct  relief  which  anger  seeks,  is  by  retalia¬ 
tion  on  the  offending  party  ;  but,  failing  in  this,  it 
finds  a  vent  in  other  directions — and  so  is  often 
known  to  deliver  itself  of  the  labouring  violence 
within,  by  the  deeds  or  the  speeches  of  violence  to 
the  utterly  undeserving  of  it;  nay,  by  the  frantic 


PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE.  335 

destruction  of  all  that  it  can  reach,  wreaking  itself 
upon  inanimate  objects,  and  ejecting  of  its  insen¬ 
sate  fury  on  the  books  and  the  windows  and  the 
furniture  that  cometh  in  its  way. 

5.  We  have  already  had  occasion  to  discrimi¬ 
nate  between  the  two  emotions  of  anger  and  grief. 
There  is  another  emotion  wherewith  anger  has  a  cer¬ 
tain  relationship  ;  even  that  of  fear.  Grief  is  felt 
because  of  an  evil  that  has  been  inflicted  already. 
Fear  is  felt  because  of  an  evil  that  is  apprehended 
in  future.  Even  anger  may  be  felt  on  either  of  these 
grounds.  We  may  be  angry  at  another,  because  of 
a  mischief  he  has  actually  done.  Or  we  may  be 
angry,  because  of  a  mischief  that  is  threatened 
or  intended  by  him.  In  the  former  case,  the 
grief  and  the  anger  may  rapidly  alternate,  the  one 
with  the  other,  as  in  the  instance  of  a  widowed 
mother,  whose  husband  has  fallen  by  the  hand  of  a 
malignant  assassin.  But,  in  the  latter  case,  the 
fear  and  the  anger  do  not  alternate  so  readily. 
They  do  not  seem  to  have  the  property  of  chang¬ 
ing  places  with  the  same  degree  of  facility.*  We 
should  say  of  anger,  that  its  most  legitimate  cause 
was  the  purpose  of  evil  against  us  in  another’s 
breast.  But  were  that  a  very  tremendous  evil, 

•  We  can  think  of  no  other  reason  for  this,  than  that  generally 
speaking,  fear,  particularly  when  excessive,  is  a  more  engrossing 
emotion  than  grief.  When  grief  is  very  excessive  too,  it  will 
keep  its  ground  in  the  heart  to  the  exclusion  even  of  anger 
against  him  who  hath  inflicted  the  calamity,  under  which  we 
mourn.  It  does  -not  arise  therefore  from  any  peculiar  property 
in  either  of  the  emotions,  that  the  one  more  generally  excludes 
ans;er  from  the  bosom  than  the  other.  It  arises  merely  from 
this,  that  fear  is  generally  a  more,  engrossing  emotion,  and  hence 
keeps  more  exclusive  possession  of  the  mind — to  the  shutting  out 
even  of  that  anger,  which  else  would  fiercely  burn  against  him. 


336  PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE 


and  were  he  who  designed  it  hopelessly  beyond 
our  power  of  resistance — then,  the  engrossing 
terror  would  displace  the  wrath.  He  would  be 
the  object  of  our  dread  ;  and,  so  long  as  he  was  so, 
he  would  not  be  the  object  of  our  resentment. 
While  we  trembled  before  him  under  the  one 
emotion,  there  would  be  no  kindling  of  our  heart 
against  him  under  the  influence  of  the  other 
emotion.  The  tyrant  who  can  instantly  bid  away 

towards  whose  hostility  it  was  that  we  felt  a  sentiment  of  terror. 
There  is  a  very  fine  example  given  by  Sir  Walter  Scott  of  the 
alternations  between  anger  and  grief,  that  took  place  in  the  same 
bosom  ;  and  we  think  that  there  is  a  dramatic  truth  in  his  repre- 
•entaiion. 

“Can  piety  the  discord  heal, 

Or  staunch  the  death-feud’s  enmity. 

Can  Christian  love,  can  patriot  zeal. 

Can  love  of  blessed  charity  ? 

No  !  vainly  to  each  holy  shrine, 

In  mutual  pilgrimage  they  drew. 

Implored  in  vain  the  grace  divine. 

For  chiefs  their  own  red  falchions  slew. 

While  Cessford  owns  the  rule  of  Car, 

While  Ettrick  boasts  the  line  of  Scott, 

The  slaughtered  chiefs,  the  mortal  jar. 

The  havoc  of  the  feudal  war. 

Shall  never  never  be  forgot. 

“  In  sorrow  o’er  Lord  Walter’s  bier 
The  vvai'like  foresters  had  bent ; 

And  many  a  flower,  and  many  a  tear. 

Old  Teviot’s  maids  and  matrons  lent. 

But  o’er  her  warrior’s  bloody  bier 
The  lady  dropped  nor  flower  nor  tear. 

Vengeance  deep-brooding  o’er  the  slain, 

Had  lock’d  the  source  of  softer  woe  ; 

And  burning  pride  and  high  disdain,  /- 
Forbade  the  rising  tear  to  flow  ; 

Until,  amid  his  sorrowing  clan, 

Her  son  lisp’d  from  the  niu’se’s  knee, 

‘  And  if  I  live  to  be  a  man. 

My  father’s  death  revenged  shall  be  ;’ 

Then  fast  the  mother’s  tears  did  seek. 

To  dew  the  infant's  kindling  cheek. 


PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE.  337 

to  execution,  any  attendant  whom  his  displeasure 
may  light  upon,  has  a  countenance  that  is  looked 
to  by  all  with  most  watchful  anxiety ;  and  the  first 
symptoms  of  a  gathering  storm  may  terrify,  but 
they  do  not  irritate.  Were  the  identical  scowl 
to  appear  against  us  on  the  face  of  an  equal,  or  still 
more  on  the  face  of  an  inferior,  there  might  in  that 
case  be  no  fear ;  and,  as  a  proof  of  the  repulsion 
that  there  is  between  the  two  emotions,  there 
would  now  be  space  for  anger  in  the  heart,  and 
anger  would  in  all  probability  take  the  occupation 
there.  This  might  help  to  explain  a  number  of 
phenomena,  for  which  we  never  thought  of  assigning 
any  principle  or  cause.  The  hare,  or  the  mouse, 
or  any  of  those  feebler  animals  that  come  under 
the  description  of  the  smaller  or  inferior  kind  of 
game,  do  not  exhibit  anger  against  their  pursuei's, 
but  fear  only — though  they  have  the  full  conviction 
of  that  being  in  the  mind  of  their  enemy,  which  is 
the  most  appropriate  cause  of  anger — even  a  wilful 
purpose  against  them  of  deadliest  mischief.  It  is 
not  always  so,  when  there  is  something  like  a 
sense  of  equality,  and  the  hope  of  a  successful 
resistance  ;  and  so,  in  certain  kinds  of  game,  as 
when  the  elephant  or  the  tiger  or  the  bear  which 
infests  a  neighbourhood,  becomes  the  object  of 
some  general  attack — -there  is  often  a  furious  con¬ 
test  as  well  as  a  chase,  and  that  because  the  terror 
is  not  so  overwhelming  as  wholly  to  have  dispos¬ 
sessed  the  anger.  And  neither  even  is  it  so, 
when  the  fear  hath  at  length  given  place  to  despair. 
For  in  like  manner  as  anger,  because  of  a  threat¬ 
ened  or  impending  evil,  presupposes  the  chance  of 
VOE.  V,  P 


338  PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE. 

warding  it  off  by  resistance — so  fear  often,  though 
not  always,  presupposes  the  chance  of  evading  it 
by  submission  or  by  flight.  But  let  the  imagina¬ 
tion  of  this  latter  chance  he  wholly  don?  away — 
let  there  now  be  in  the  mind  a  certainty  of  the 
dread  infliction,  as  a  thing  that  is  wholly  inevitable 
— let  the  mind  become,  as  it  were,  reconciled  to 
this  certainty ;  and  then  shall  we  frequently  see, 
that,  so  soon  as  terror  hath  fled  away  from  the 
bosom,  there  is  an  instantaneous  reaction  and  re¬ 
appearance  of  anger.  The  two,  it  would  appear, 
can  have  no  fellowship ;  and,  though  the  same 
cause  be  competent  to  the  production  of  each,  it 
cannot  produce  them  together.  So  soon,  how¬ 
ever,  as  the  one  effect  vanishes,  the  other  takes  its 
place ;  and  thus  it  is,  that,  when  fear  leaves  the 
heart,  fury  enters  upon  the  possession  of  it;  and 
creatures  of  the  gentlest  and  most  timid  nature 
will  turn  in  fierceness  to  make  their  last  stand 
against  their  pursuers,  and  have  been  seen  in 
stoutest  heroism  to  expire.  It  has  even  been 
known,  that,  after  the  sentence  was  passed,  and 
before  the  reprieve  was  denied  to  the  malefactor  in 
his  cell,  there  were  nought  but  the  agitations  of 
terror  in  his  guilty  bosom — but  that  when  he  at 
length  saw  his  fate  to  be  inevitable,  he  muttered 
the  curses  of  vindictiveness  and  spite  against  the 
judges  and  the  accusers  and  the  laws.  And  thus 
it  is  that  we  often  hear,  of  what  a  man  is  capable 
of  doing,  after  that  he  is  desperate.  He  who  hath 
had  experience  in  battles,  may  oft  have  witnessed 
how  the  two  emotions  of  fear  and  anger  alternate, 
the  one  with  the  other.  It  is  exemplified,  not  by 


PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE.  339 

individuals  alone,  but  by  a  whole  nation,  when  the 
terrors  of  a  coming  armada  have  reduced  to  tho 
most  humbling  expedients  and  offers  of  submission. 
The  fear,  in  that  stage  of  the  proceedings,  hath 
left  no  room  for  the  anger ;  but  should  all  their 
attempts  at  negotiation  be  spurned  away  by  the 
proud  invader;  and  the  returning  embassy  have 
banished  their  last  hopes  of  peace  and  safety  from 
the  land ;  and  they  should  circulate  withal  the  story 
of  all  that  honour  due  to  venerable  sages  and  the 
representatives  of  noble  ancestry,  having  been 
trampled  by  the  tyrant’s  insolence  into  dust — then 
might  it  be  seen,  how  the  whole  nation,  shall  by 
one  consent,  lift  itself  up  from  the  crouching  atti¬ 
tude  into  which  it  had  fallen ;  and,  gathering  fresh 
energy  from  despair,  will  the  war-cry  of  a  stern 
and  resolved  patriotism  be  heard  to  resoun-d  from 
one  end  to  the  other  of  it.  It  is  often  so,  in  the 
history  of  this  world’s  oppressors.  It  is  not  when 
firmly  seated  on  their  bai’baric  throne,  that  they 
are  the  objects  of  anger — for  by  the  power  of  terror, 
that  other  emotion  wherewith  it  hath  no  affinity,  is 
this  emotion  overborne.  But  when  all  despair  of 
improvement  or  redress  hath  at  length  banished 
the  pusillanimous  inmate  from  the  bosom  of  his 
dependents,  then  doth  the  more  noble  and  generous 
inmate  succeed  in  its  room ;  and  the  cruelties  of  a 
despot’s  reign  often  come  to  be  expiated  by  the 
tremendous  reaction  of  a  nation’s  vengeance — who, 
in  very  proportion  to  their  former  dread,  now 
wreak  upon  his  guilty  head  the  keenest  execrations 
of  their  long  smothered  resentment,  the  now  eman¬ 
cipated  sense  of  their  accumulated  wrongs. 


340  PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE, 

6.  The  relationship  wherein  anger  and  fear 
stand  to  each  other,  may  explain  the  reason  why 
anger  is  so  promptly  and  powerfully  felt,  on  the 
first  sight  of  one  whom  we  purpose  to  attack — but 
from  whom  we  have  some  difficulty  or  resistance 
to  apprehend.  There  is  a  secret  sense  within, 
that  this  nascent  fear  must  not  be  given  way  to,  or 
the  object  is  lost ;  and  thus  a  painful  struggle 
ensues  between  two  opposite  feelings,  the  desire 
of  gaining  this  object  and  the  dread  of  losing  it ; 
and  a  pain  that  has  been  created  by  the  presence 
of  a  living  creature,  can  easily  be  referred  to  him 
as  the  cause  of  it ;  and  so  anger  rushes  into  JuU 
possession  of  the  breast,  and  expels  "that  incipient 
terror  which  would  else  have  paralyzed  its  occupier. 
And  thus  we  should  expect  from  a  beast  of  prey, 
a  fiercer  and  more  hideous  growl,  at  its  first  onset 
with  a  formidable  than  with  a  feeble  antagonist. 
It  is  thought  of  man,  that  the  fear  of  him  and  the 
dread  of  him,  are  still  upon  every  creature  under 
heaven ;  and  this  may  explain  the  grim  resentful¬ 
ness  of  aspect  wherewith  he  is  peculiarly  regarded, 
when  the  savage  animal  hath  marked  him  for  its 
victim.  Had  not  the  power  of  anger  come  to  its 
aid,  its  courage  might  have  failed ;  and,  to  bear  it 
up  as  it  were,  may  we  presume  that  the  tiger  braces 
his  spirit  for  the  assault,  by  the  angry  roar  that  he 
emits,  ere  he  maketh  the  spring  by  which  he  seizes 
on  so  noble  a  prize — just  as  the  school-boy  whistles 
loudest  in  the  dark,  when  likest  to  be  scared  by 
his  imagination. 

7.  There  is  no  doubt  that  the  natural  and  uni¬ 
versal  tendency  of  a  sense  of  injustice,  is  to  excite 


PlfBNOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE.  341 


in  the  bosom  of  him  who  has  sustained  it,  that 
quick  and  instant  displeasure,  which  is  neither  more 
nor  less  than  the  emotion  of  anger.  But  though 
the  sense  of  having  been  injured,  should  in  all  cases 
be  followed  up  by  the  feeling  of  anger — must  it 
therefore  be  that  the  existence  of  this  feeling  in 
any  heart,  implies  that  it  is  smarting  under  the 
sense  of  a  recent  or  a  past  injustice  ?  There  is  a 
felt  provocation ;  and  the  question  is,  what  has 
been  the  provocative  ?  Must  it  at  all  times  be  a 
felt  or  a  fancied  injustice  ?  Anger  is  like  the  natural 
expression  or  utterance  of  one  who  imagines  that 
he  has  been  wrongously  used ;  and  if  a  likeness  to 
the  truth  never  in  any  instance  varied  from  the  truth 
itself — then  from  the  phenomena  of  anger,  we  could 
at  once  gather  the  characters  of  justice.  But  some 
of  the  instances  already  quoted  make  it  certain, 
that  anger  cannot  at  all  times  be  referred  to  a  sense 
of  injustice  as  its  cause.  It  certainly  may  in  many 
instances ;  and  even  with  the  semblance  at  least  of 
probability  can  be  often  so  accounted  for  in  the 
case  of  the  inferior  animals — as  in  the  lioness  de¬ 
prived  of  her  whelps,  or  the  dog  of  its  bone  after 
it  might  be  imagined  that  the  possession  and  the 
partial  use  of  it  had  given  him  somewhat  the  feel¬ 
ing  of  a  property  therein.  We  could  even  almost 
without  any  stretch  of  violence,  imagine,  that  the 
fierce  and  vindictive  glare  which  is  instantly  lighted 
up  in  the  eye  of  the  bull,  on  the  appearance  of  a 
person  in  the  field  where  he  is  grazing,  might  be 
due  to  the  feeling  of  an  injurious  encroachment  on 
that  domain  which  he  considers  as  his  own.  His 
desire,  at  all  events,  is  to  range  at  pleasure  and 


342  PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDr 

without  disturbauce  over  the  whole  extent  of  if, , 
and  he  is  irritated  because  thwarted  in  this  desire; 
and  thwarted  all  the  more  painfully  in  proportion 
to  the  strength  or  the  formidableness  of  his  imagined 
adversary.  It  is  thus  that  there  might  be  no  sen¬ 
sible  irritation  on  the  appearance  of  a  lamb  or  of  a 
fowl ;  but  a  manifest  and  declared  exhibition  of  it. 
on  the  appearance  of  a  man— while,  on  the  appear¬ 
ance  of  a  lion  or  an  elephant,  the  anger  might  be 
overborne  by  fear,  and  the  resolute  fury  of  the  else 
indignant  brute  melt  away  into  the  imbecility  of  a 
coward.  But  it  is  to  the  case  of  vivid  and  un¬ 
mixed  anger  that  we  now  look;  and  then  it  is 
evident  that  an  annoyance  is  felt,  and  that  a  living 
creature  seen  and  known  to  be  the  cause  of  it  is 
scowled  at  as  an  enemy,  and  as  an  enemy  pursued 
as  the  object  of  a  distinct  and  personal  retaliation. 

8.  Nay  there  is  something  analogous  to  this,  in 
the  case  of  that  anger  wherewith  a  beast  of  prey 
is  impelled  to  spring  forward  upon  its  victim.  It 
would  not  so  spring  forward  upon  a  dead  animal ; 
more  especially,  if  it  lay  in  fragments  without  the 
semblance  of  its  original  form.  However  ravenous 
its  appetite  may  be,  we  apprehend  that  in  this  case 
there  would  be  no  anger  to  wing  the  celerity  of  its 
movement ;  but  simply  the  eagerness  of  hunger  to 
be  satiated.  Neither  do  we  imagine  that  there 
could  be  much  of  anger,  when  a  timid  unresisting 
victim  gives  itself  up  an  easy  prey  to  the  fangs  of 
its  devourer.  It  is  when  resistance,  or  rapid  flight 
is  expected;  it  is  when  the  appearance  of  one 
creature  having  life,  hath  kindled  both  an  a})petite 
and  an  apprehension  in  the  breast  of  another,  and 


PHENOMENA  OK  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE.  343 

BO  a  painful  conflict  hath  been  raised  which  it  might 
refer  to  an  enemy  as  its  cause — it  is  this,  we  con¬ 
ceive,  that  will  explain  the  phenomena  of  this 
emotion  in  the  wilderness — those  outcries  of  rage 
and  resentment,  which  resound  throughout  the 
amplitudes  of  savage  and  solitary  Nature.  Let 
there  simply  be  a  desire  felt,  and  an  obstacle  arise 
in  the  way  of  its  fulfllment — if  this  obstacle  be  a 
living  creature,  a  feeling  of  resentment  is  felt  in 
consequence;  and  the  natural  outgoing  of  this 
resentment  is  revenge. 

9.  Such  is  the  general  description  of  anger, 
both  in  its  object  and  its  cause — from  which  how¬ 
ever  there  are  two  anomalies,  that,  at  the  same 
time,  are  not  altogether  inexplicable.  First,  the 
cause  of  our  irritation  might  in  no  shape  be  a  thing 
that  lives  or  feels — as  the  unlucky  mal-adjustment 
of  objects  that  are  wholly  mute  and  inanimate. 
Could  we  trace  this  in  any  way  to  another’s  care¬ 
lessness,  then  the  anomaly  would  be  at  an  end; 
and  the  mind  would  feel  itself  in  a  state  more 
attuned  to  the  annoyances  by  which  it  had  been 
plied,  could  it  only  find  out  a  living  or  intelligent 
author  of  them.  In  defect  of  this,  however,  there 
is  often  still  a  sort  of  general  undirected  wrath 
infused  into  the  moral  system,  by  a  mere  series  of 
mishaps  and  perversities  that  are  altogether  unin¬ 
tentional — due,  we  imagine,  to  the  way  in  which 
that  system  is  constituted ;  and  by  which  its  very 
promptitude  to  refer  its  daily  and  hourly  crosses, 
as  so  many  provocations  to  a  designing  cause, 
will,  even  in  the  absence  of  such  a  cause,  lead  it  to 
imagine  one,  rather  than  have  a  feeling  within  that 


344  PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE. 

has  no  counterpart  without — rather  than  be  In  a 
passion,  without  an  object  on  which  that  passion 
can  discharge  itself.  And  then  when  brought  to 
this  state,  it  is  not  difficult  to  explain  the  second 
anomaly,  or  why  one  should  wreak  his  resentful 
feelings  on  a  MTong  object — for  after  the  violence 
hath  been  fermented  and  wrought  up  within,  it 
would  not  have  answered  the  purposes  of  nature 
in  our  constitution  that  it  should  be  pent  up  there  j 
nor  could  it  have  been  at  all  a  check  on  any  offered 
injustice,  unless  there  had  been  a  relief  and  a  plea¬ 
sure  felt  in  the  dissipation  of  it  without.  And  so 
it  is,  that,  when  anger  cannot  find  the  right  object 
on  which  it  may  discharge  itself,  it  will  often  pour 
its  effervescence  on  the  wrong  one ;  and  children 
or  servants  may  suffer,  even  perhaps  because  I 
myself  have  spilt  or  torn  or  broke  what  is  valuable 
by  my  own  mismanagement ;  and  the  offence 
which  has  been  done  to  me  by  even  the  uncon¬ 
scious  elements  of  Nature,  may  have  to  be  ex¬ 
piated  by  friends  or  visitors  as  totally  unconscious 
of  it  as  they;  and,  to  complete  the  history  of  this 
strange  and  fitful  waywardness,  the  turbulence  in 
the  heart,  rather  than  corrode  and  fester  there,  will 
go  forth  upon  the  inanimates  around  it,  will  up  to 
its  power  do  the  work  of  the  tempest  on  the  field 
through  which  it  passes — so  as  that  shrubs  and 
branches  and  thistle-tops  shall  all  bear  testimony 
to  the  violence  of  the  moral  storm  that  has  just 
blown  over  it. 

10.  It  is  because  of  the  blinding  and  bewilder¬ 
ing  effect  of  anger,  that  an  expedient  has  been 
devised,  by  which  to  transmute  this  emotion  into 


PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE.  345 

a  calm  moral  judgment  on  the  character  of  the 
offence  that  has  awakened  it.  We  do  not  happen 
to  think,  that  our  sense  of  right  and  wrong  origi¬ 
nates  in  this  department  of  our  nature  at  all ;  but 
they  who  do  thiuk  so,  as  if  compelled  by  the  ano¬ 
malous  deviations  from  truth  and  reason  into  which 
men  are  often  precipitated  by  this  wayward  affec¬ 
tion,  have  resorted  to  the  imagination  of  a  third 
person,  looking  on  at  the  altercation  of  two  parties 
— the  one  having  given  the  provocation,  and  the 
other  feeling  a  resentment  in  consequence.  It  is 
thus  that  Dr.  Adam  Smith  manages  his  argument, 
in  the  celebrated  Theory  of  Moral  Sentiments. 
He  supposes  anger  to  be  felt  by  one  person,  on 
some  provocation  that  has  been  rendered  to  him 
by  another.  But  he  is  too  well  aware  of  the 
magnifying  and  distorting  power  of  this  emotion, 
to  measure  the  injustice  of  the  aggression  by  the 
aggrieved  and  outraged  sensibilities  of  the  sufferer. 
And  so  a  third  individual  is  called  in,  whom  he 
conceives  to  place  himself  in  the  situation  of  him 
who  is  angry ;  and  if,  when  he  thus  enters  into  his 
situation,  he  finds  that  he  also  enters  into  his  feel¬ 
ings,  or  goes  along  with  him— then  it  is,  that  he 
concludes  the  anger  to  be  right,  and  that  which 
hath  provoked  the  anger  of  course  to  be  wrong. 
It  is  thus  that  he  accounts  for  the  way,  in  which 
the  sense  of  another’s  demerit  or  of  another’s  injus¬ 
tice  arises  in  the  heart.  The  correspondency  of 
feeling  that  there  is,  between  him  who  occupies 
the  situation  of  an  injured  person,  and  him  who 
by  a  mere  effort  of  mental  substitution  conceives 
himself  in  that  situation— he  denominates  sympathy. 

V  2 


346  PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE. 

When  there  is  a  want  of  sympathy  with  the  anger 
that  is  felt  or  manifested  by  him  who  figures  him¬ 
self  to  have  been  wronged — then  there  is  no  impu¬ 
tation  of  demerit  against  the  aggressor.  But  when 
there  is  this  sympathy  and  fellow-feeling,  then  the 
anger  is  appro ven  of,  the  object  it  is  turned  against 
is  disapproven  of ;  the  thing  that  gives  rise  to  the 
provocation  is  not  only  felt  to  be  unjust  by  the 
sufferer  ;  but  it  is  judged  to  be  so  by  the  specta¬ 
tor.  The  sympathy  hath  stamped,  as  it  were, 
and  authenticated  the  moral  character  of  the  deed 
in  question  ;  and  what  in  the  breast  of  the  sufferer 
was  merely  a  sensation,  is  advanced  in  the  heart  of 
the  spectator  to  the  rank  of  a  sentence  or  of  a 
judgment. 

1 1 .  The  controversy  upon  this  subject  is — whether 
it  is  the  sympathy  which  originates  our  moral 
judgment,  or  our  moral  judgment  which  regulates 
and  determines  the  sympathy.  Dr.  Smith  con¬ 
ceived  that  the  sympathy  took  the  antecedency  of 
our  moral  judgments ;  and  this  principle  has  been 
conceived  by  the  great  majority  of  our  writers 
on  morals,  and  we  think  justly  conceived,  to  be 
erroneous.  It  is  a  theory  exceedingly  well  illus¬ 
trated  by  himself,  and  exceedingly  well  appreciated 
by  Dr.  Thomas  Brown.  In  spite  of  its  funda¬ 
mental  error,  the  book  is  worthy  of  most  attentive 
perusal — abounding,  as  it  does,  in  the  most  felici¬ 
tous  illustrations  of  human  life,  and  in  shrewd  and 
successful  fetches  among  the  mysteries  of  the 
human  character. 

12.  It  is  not  because  we  sympathize  with  the 
resentment  that  we  hold  the  action  in  question  to 


PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE.  347 

be  the  proper  and  approved  object  of  this  feeling ; 
but  because  we  hold  it  to  be  the  proper  and  ap¬ 
proved  object  of  resentment,  that  we  sympathize. 
And  we  do  so,  not  on  the  impulse  of  principles  that 
are  originated  by  sympathy  ;  but  on  the  impulse  of 
principles  which,  original  in  themselves,  originate 
the  sympathy  that  we  feel.  When  we  see  an  un¬ 
offending  individual  subjected  in  his  person  to  the 
wanton  insult  of  a  blow’,  or  in  his  property  to  the  in¬ 
road  of  some  ruthless  depredation— we  do  not  need 
to  wdtness  the  resentment  of  his  bosom,  ere  a  like 
or  a  kindred  feeling  shall  arise  as  by  infection  in 
our  own  ;  nor  mentally  to  place  ourselves  in  his 
situation,  and  thus  to  ascertain  how  we  should  feel 
aggrieved  or  affronted  by  the  treatment  that  we 
see  him  to  experience.  The  circumstance  of  not 
being  the  sufferer  myself  may  give  a  greater 
authority  to  my  judgment — because  a  judgment 
unwarped  by  the  passions  or  the  partialities  of 
selfishness  ;  but  still  it  is  a  judgment  that  comes 
forth  without  that  process  of  internal  manufacture, 
of  which  Dr.  Smith  conceives  it  to  be  the  resulting 
commodity.  We  judge  as  immediately  and  direct¬ 
ly  on  a  question  of  equity  betw^een  one  man  and 
another,  as  we  can  on  a  question  of  equality  be¬ 
tween  one  line  and  another  :  And  when  that  equity 
is  violated,  there  is  as  instantaneous  an  emotion 
awakened  in  the  heart  of  me  the  spectator,  as  there 
is  in  the  heart  of  him  the  sufferer.  With  him  it  is 
an<^er.  With  me  it  is  denominated  indignation— 
the  one  being  the  resentment  of  him  who  simply 
feels,  that  he  has  been  disturbed  or  encroached 
upon  in  the  enjoyment  of  that  which  he  hath  habv- 


348  PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE, 

tually  regarded  to  be  his  own  ;  the  other  a  resent¬ 
ment  felt  on  perceiving  a  like  encroachment  on 
that  whicli  might  equitably  or  rightfully  be  regard¬ 
ed  as  his  own. 

13.  And  thus  may  we  perceive  of  injustice,  that, 
after  all,  anger  is  the  emotion  which  is  suited  to  it 
— an  emotion  which  may  be  wrongfully  excited, 
when  there  is  no  injustice  ;  but  which  is  the  right¬ 
ful  and  the  respondent  feeling,  when  there  is.  In 
like  manner  as  we  should  say  of  sound,  that  it  is 
neither  seen  nor  felt  nor  tasted  but  that  it  is  heard 
— so  should  we  say  of  injustice,  that,  purely  and 
apart  from  all  its  accompaniments,  it  is  neither 
rejoiced  in  nor  grieved  for  nor  esteemed  but  that 
it  is  resented.  Other  exhibitions  of  character  and 
conduct  are  met  by  other  emotions ;  but  anger  is 
the  appropriate  emotion  wherewith  the  view  of 
injustice  is  met,  and  by  which  the  aggrieved  person 
feels  himself  urged  to  pay  it  back  again  by  an  act 
of  retaliation.  It  is  that  of  which  the  sufferer,  in 
his  anger,  feels  it  desirable  that  it  should  be  chas¬ 
tised  ;  and  it  is  that  of  which  the  spectator  in  his 
indignation,  that  is  but  a  secondary  or  reflected 
anger,  judges  that  it  deserves  to  be  punished. 

14.  The  emotion  of  Gratitude  is  altogether  a 
counterpart  to  that  of  anger.  The  one  is  the  dis¬ 
pleasure  felt,  when  a  hurt  or  an  annoyance  is 
sustained.  The  other  is  the  pleasure  that  is  felt 
when  a  benefit  is  conferred.  In  the  one,  there  is 
the  desire  of  avenging  the  hurt  by  an  act  of  retali¬ 
ation.  In  the  other  there  is  the  desire  of  retuim- 
ing  the  kindness  that  has  been  shown,  by  an  act 


^PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE.  349 

or  a  manifestation  of  kindness  bank  again.  And 
there  are  certain  phenomena  of  gratitude,  which 
correspond  to  the  phenomena  that  have  already 
been  quotnd  regarding  anger,  and  which  admit  of 
being  similarly  explained.  The  proper  object  of 
both  these  emotions  is  a  living  and  a  willing  agent, 
who,  in  the  one  case,  hath  manifested  to  us  a  pur¬ 
pose  of  kindness ;  and,  in  the  other,  a  purpose  of 
mischief.  Now  we  have  already  seen  that  anger 
might  be  excited  by  a  cross  or  adverse  circum¬ 
stance,  when  there  could  be  no  purpose ;  and 
might  furthermore  be  wreaked  on  such  objects,  as 
are  incapable  of  feeling  the  retaliation  that  is  put 
forth  against  them.  It  is  the  same  of  gratitude 
an  emotion  felt  by  the  aged  general,  towards 
that  trusty  blade  which  has  availed  him  in  many  an 
hour  of  danger ;  and  which  has  been  preferred  to 
some  conspicuous  place  in  one  of  the  lordliest  of 
his  halls,  as  the  memorial  of  past  services— felt 
even  by  the  citizen  to  that  staff,  which  hath  been 
the  support  and  the  companion  of  many  a  walk 
that  is  gladdened  by  the  bright  association  of  other 
days  most  of  all,  felt  by  the  mariner  for  that 
plank  which  bore  him  in  safety  to  the  land,  through 
these  loud  and  angry  surges  that  overwhelmed  so 
many  of  his  shipmates  in  a  watery  grave.  lie 
might  make  a  table  or  a  chair  of  so  precious  a 
material ;  but  he  would  recoil  from  hewing  it  into 
firewood,  as  from  an  act  of  sacrilege.  It  comes 
nearer  to  the  primary  emotion  of  gratitude,  when 
the  object  of  it  is  one  of  the  inferior  animals, 
though,  even  then,  the  good  which  we  have  derived 
from  them  might  not  be  referred  to  any  distinct 


350  PIIF.NO.MKN  A  OF  AN(;E!1  AND  GRATITUDE. 

purpose  of  kindness  or  good  will  upon  their  part. 
Yet  still  it  is  an  occasional,  and  certainly  a  very 
amiable  indulgence  of  the  feeling,  when  the  worn 
out  hunter  is  permitted  to  graze,  and  be  still  the 
favourite  of  all  the  domestics  through  the  remain¬ 
der  of  his  life — or  when  the  old  and  shaggy  house 
dog,  that  has  now  ceased  to  be  serviceable,  is 
nevertheless  sure  of  its  regular  meals  and  a  decent 
funeral — and,  to  quote  the  case  given  by  Dr. 
Smith,  we  know  not  well  how  a  more  painful 
revolt  could  be  inflicted  upon  the  feelings  by  any 
historical  instance  of  depravity,  than  was  done  by 
him  who  stabbed  the  horse  that  had  carried  him 
across  an  arm  of  the  sea,  lest  that  animal  should 
afterwards  distinguish  some  other  person  by  a 
similar  adventure.  And  as  the  gratitude  might 
be  excited  by  a  cause  distinct  from  the  proper 
or  the  primary  cause  of  this  emotion — so,  like 
anger,  might  it  be  discharged  on  an  object  dis¬ 
tinct  from  the  proper  one.  Just  as  a  day  of 
perverse  and  provoking  misadventures  might  render 
a  man  a  terror,  for  the  time,  to  his  innocent  family 
— so  a  day  of  luck,  or  of  unexpected  benefits  from 
one  friend,  might  give  him  an  aspect  of  placid 
benignity  towards  other  friends  or  other  familiars 
who  had  no  hand  in  them— so  as  to  constitute  it  a 
happy  season,  even  for  strangers  or  those  who  are 
altogether  neutral,  to  accost  him  with  their  solici¬ 
tations.  These  however,  are  all  devious  or  de¬ 
rivative  phenomena,  that  might  be  traced  to  asso¬ 
ciation,  or  the  power  of  fancy,  or  even  to  certain 
physical  peculiarities  in  the  human  constitution — 
arvd  so  as  to  leave  unaffected  the  substance  of  the 


PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE.  351 

two  definitions,  which  have  been  given  of  anger 
and  of  gratitude— viz.,  that  the  one  is  an  emotion 
of  displeasure  awakened  by  the  view  of  a  wilful 
mischief,  and  urging  him  who  is  under  its  power 
to  return  evil  for  the  evil  that  has  been  inflicted  j 
and  that  the  other  is  an  emotion  of  complacency, 
awakened  by  a  benefit  originating  in  the  kindness 
or  goodwill  of  another,  and  disposing  him  who  feels 
it  to  return  good  for  the  good  that  has  been  be¬ 
stowed. 

15.  The  rightful  object  for  my  emotion  of 
gratitude  is  another’s  goodwill  to  me ;  and  in  like 
manner  as  the  grief  for  any  hurt  or  harm  that  I 
have  sustained,  is  a  thing  distinct  and  distinguish¬ 
able  from  the  anger  that  I  feel  towards  the  inju¬ 
rious  disposition  of  him  who  hath  inflicted  it — so  is 
the  gladness  that  I  have  because  of  a  benefit  alto¬ 
gether  distinct  from  the  gratitude  that  I  feel 
toward  the  benefactor.  It  is  not  the  gift,  but 
the  goodwill  that  prompted  the  gift  which  properly 
causes  my  gratitude.  The  gift  might  be  conceived 
as  coming  to  my  door  on  a  thousand  other  impulses, 
than  that  of  kind  regard  towards  myself.  It  might 
have  been  dictated  by  a  spirit  of  ostentation  ;  or 
extorted  by  the  voice  of  the  neighbourhood,  that 
called  for  some  decent  and  neighbour-like  contri¬ 
bution  to  my  case  of  distress.  Now  were  any  of 
these  seen  to  be  the  actuating  principles  of  the 
donation,  I  might  be  glad  of  the  gift,  but  not 
grateful  to  the  giver.  Gratitude,  in  fact,  is,  strictly 
and  properly,  the  response  of  one  mental  affection 
to  another.  It  is  the  return  of  goodwill  for  good¬ 
will.  It  is  the  moral  echo  of  kindness  to  kindness 


352  PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE. 

back  again — reflected  from  one  bosom  to  another; 
and  the  only  function  of  gifts  or  of  services,  in  this 
reciprocal  interchange  of  feelings,  is,  that  they  are 
merely  the  exponents  of  these  feelings — or  the 
vehicle  by  which  they  are  uttered  and  made  known. 
It  is  true  that,  generally  speaking,  the  larger  the 
gift  the  w'armer  is  the  gratitude,  but  this  is  only 
because  it  indicates  a  greater  force  of  kindness  or 
goodwill  towards  us.  It  is  a  palpable  measui’e,  by 
which  we  might  estimate  the  dimensions  of  that 
regard  in  anotlier’s  bosom,  which  calls  forth  a  pro¬ 
portionate  regard  in  ours.  But  could  the  strength 
of  the  affection  be  as  unequivocally  indicated  in 
another  way  than  by  the  magnitude  of  the  visible 
offering — we  should  come  to  ascertain  that  it  really 
is  not  the  thing  given  by  the  hand,  but  the  thing 
that  prompts  the  giver’s  heart,  to  which  gratitude 
attaches  itself,  and  upon  which  it  complacently 
rests  and  terminates.  It  is  thus  that  the  humble 
service  of  a  poor  man  who  has  nothing  to  give ;  or 
the  tried  fidelity  of  a  menial,  who  can  only  mani¬ 
fest  the  concern  that  he  takes  in  the  interest  of 
his  employer,  by  the  discreetness  of  those  little 
bargains  or  savings  that  he  makes  in  his  behalf; 
or  even  the  tear  and  the  fallen  countenance  of  a 
domestic,  when  some  disaster  hath  visited  the 
family — it  is  thus  that  these  exhibitions  of  the 
outer  man,  if  they  only  authenticate  the  kindness 
of  principle  that'  operates  among  the  feelings  and 
throughout  the  mental  economy  of  the  inner  man, 
have  in  them  all  the  charm  of  that  kindness  which 
is  regarded  as  more  substantial,  only  because  more 
perceptible  to  the  man  of  grosser  observation. 


PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE.  353 


Thei-e  are  some  who  have  not  the  soul  of  gratitude 
in  them  ;  and  to  whom  the  gratuity  of  a  most  deli¬ 
cate  and  disinterested  friendship  would  minister 
no  other  and  no  higher  delight,  than  would  a 
sum  of  money  found  upon  the  road.  This  will 
suggest  a  very  obvious  analysis ;  and  we  can 
be  at  no  loss  to  separate  the  sordid  gratification 
that  is  felt  in  the  gift,  from  that  higher  gratifi¬ 
cation  of  sentiment  which  is  felt  in  the  goodwill 
that  prompted  it.  ^ 

16.  And  here  it  may  occur  to  us,  how  cheap 
and  accessible  are  the  best  enjoyments  of  humanity. 
If  in  that  compound  emotion  of  pleasure,  which  is 
felt  on  the  receiving  of  a  gift,  it  be  indeed  true, 
that  the  sensation  of  the  giver’s  kindness  far  out¬ 
weighs  the  sensation  of  the  giver’s  present — then 
with  how  lavish  a  hand,  might  he  who  could  dis¬ 
pense  the  elements  of  moral  worth  and  goodness 
among  his  fellows,  scatter  blessings  innumerable 
over  the  face  of  society.  There  is  a  gladness  in 
the  conscious  possession  of  another’s  love,  that  is 
altogether  separate  from  any  gladness  or  gratifica¬ 
tion  that  might  be  ministered  by  the  fruit  of 
another’s  liberality.  It  is  thus  that  every  possess¬ 
or  of  a  heart  hath  a  treasury  within  himself,  out 
of  which  he  might  strew  the  path  of  his  journey 
in  the  world,  with  beatitudes  of  the  first  and  the 
highest  order.  With  an  eye  that  beams  in  gracious¬ 
ness  upon  all  his  fellows,  and  a  countenance  lighted 
up  by  the  smiles  of  an  honest  cordiality  on  every 
creature  he  meets  with — he  might,  without  the 
means  or  the  faculties  of  any  material  donation 
whatever,  contribute  the  richest  supplies  to  the 


354  PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE. 

mass  of  human  enjoyment.  And  so  are  we  war¬ 
ranted  to  infer,  the  vast  inherent  capacities  of 
happiness,  which  reside  in  every  aggregate  of 
sentient  and  moral  and  intelligent  creatures. 
Even  in  the  most  abject  habitations  of  poverty, 
let  but  the  reciprocal  play  of  kind  affections  be 
made  to  operate  throughout;  and  there  would 
instantly  arise  a  moral  sunshine,  wherein  all  the 
families  might  rejoice.  We  know  not  what  in 
heaven  will  be  the  sensible  exchanges,  by  gift  or 
by  service,  of  love  and  goodwill,  among  the  inmates 
of  that  place  of  ecstasy.  But,  apart  from  all  gifts 
and  from  all  that  ministers  in  this  world  to  the 
desires  of  selfishness,  we  can  see,  how  out  of  a 
moral  economy  alone,  by  mind  acting  upon  mind 
and  one  benevolent  emotion  re-echoing  to  another, 
there  are  materials  enough  out  of  which  an  Elysi¬ 
um  might  be  formed.  And  in  proportion  as  this 
goodwill  on  the  one  hand,  and  its  responding 
gratitude  on  the  other,  are  multiplied  upon  earth 
— in  that  proportion,  shall  it  be  assimilated,  in 
its  joys  as  well  as  in  its  virtues  to  the  paradise 
that  is  above.  It  is  not  by  turning  every  thing 
into  gold,  that  the  delights  of  the  golden  age  are 
at  length  to  be  realized.  It  is  by  a  higher  and 
a  nobler  alchemy — the  alchemy  of  the  heart,  which 
can  transmute  every  condition  of  human  life  into 
one  of  purest  blessedness ;  which,  even  without 
the  gifts,  can  pour  a  lustre  on  all  around  it  by  the 
manifestations  of  kindness ;  which,  by  the  ethereal 
play  of  the  affections  alone,  can  give  a  transport 
and  a  tranquillity  that  wealth  cannot  buy;  and, 
singly  by  the  mechanism  of  human  feehngs,  can 


PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE.  355 


work  off  the  best  and  most  precious  ingredients 
that  enter  into  the  comfort  of  human  families. 

17.  We  have  the  very  counterpart  of  this  in  the 
wrong  affections  of  our  nature.  As  there  is  an 
essential  delight  in  the  interchange  of  good  feel¬ 
ings,  so  there  is  an  essential  dissatisfaction  and 
misery  in  the  interchange  of  bad  ones ;  and  that 
apart  altogether  from  the  material  harm  that  has 
been  suffered  under  the  operation  of  them.  Just 
as  in  the  reciprocal  workings  of  kindness  and  gra¬ 
titude,  there  is  a  joy  independent  of  the  gift  or  the 
service  that  may  have  passed  between  them — so  in 
the  reciprocal  workings  of  injustice  and  anger,  there 
is  a  wretchedness  distinct  from  any  loss  that  has 
been  sustained  in  property,  or  from  any  physical 
pain  that  has  been  inflicted  upon  the  person.  When 
we  lose  one  sum  by  accident,  and  an  equal  sum  by 
dishonesty,  there  is  a  felt  uneasiness  in  both  cases; 
but  we  must  be  conscious  that  the  two  kinds  of 
mental  uneasiness  are  totally  diverse,  the  one  from 
the  other ;  and  that  to  the  best  minds,  the  moral 
smart  is  far  the  more  pungent  and  intolerable.  It 
is  that  an  injury,  which,  in  respect  of  its  material 
dimensions,  is  the  veriest  bagatelle,  may  transport 
a  man  out  of  all  comfort  and  patience  for  hours 
together.  He  could  have  borne  without  a  pang  a 
far  heavier  deprivation  from  the  hand  of  misfor¬ 
tune.  But  when  laid  upon  him  by  the  hand  of 
malice  or  of  fraudulency,  this  he  cannot  bear.  It 
is  thus  that  human  beings,  in  the  partnerships  of 
trade,  or  even  in  the  little  pilferments  that  go  on 
under  the  domestic  roof  and  in  the  bosom  of  families, 
may,  by  a  series  of  delinquencies  pecuniarily  so 


356  PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE, 

small,  that  the  whole  yearly  expense  of  them  could 
be  covered  for  a  trifle,  so  hurt  and  harass  the  spirits 
of  each  other,  that  all  the  year  round  may  be  spent 
in  a  continual  fester  of  vexations  and  disquietudes 
and  most  painfully  distressing  emotions.  There 
are  many  who  would  rejoice  to  purchase  an  im¬ 
munity  from  these,  by  a  gratuity  of  ten-fold  greater 
amount  than  all  that  they  shall  ever  lose  by  them ; 
and  that,  for  the  single  purpose  of  being  suffered 
to  breathe  in  a  moral  atmosphere  of  fidelity  and 
friendship — of  being  delivered,  not  from  the  expen¬ 
siveness  of  treachery,  but  from  the  hateful  aspect 
and  presence  of  treachery  itself.  In  a  wmrd,  there 
are  moral  elements,  that,  purely  by  their  own 
operation  of  acting  and  reacting,  can  either  minister 
the  utmost  complacency  to  the  heart,  or  can  cor¬ 
rode  and  agonize  it  to  the  uttermost.  There  are 
virtues,  which,  of  themselves  and  separate  from  all 
consequences,  are  sweet  unto  the  taste  of  the  inner 
man — and  there  are  vices,  which,  of  themselves 
and  separate  alike  from  all  consequences,  have  in 
them  the  bitterness  of  gall  and  wormwood.  A 
Heaven  without  the  help  of  sensible  delights  can 
be  formed  of  the  one.  A  Hell  without  the  help 
of  sensible  torments  could  be  formed  of  the  other ; 
and  the  very  aspect  of  cruelty,  without  its  inflic¬ 
tions — the  very  glare  of  hatred,  without  its  efforts 
of  mischievous  activity — the  very  presence  of 
treachery,  without  the  actual  plying  of  its  artifices 
• — the  very  juxtaposition  of  other  beings,  in  whose 
bosoms  w'e  know  that  there  dwell  all  that  is  base 
and  all  that  is  unkindly — in  these,  and  in  these 
alone,  there  are  materials  enough  to  constitute  a 


PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE.  357 


dire  and  a  dreadful  Pandemonium ;  and  to  be  shut 
up  with  these  through  Eternity,  though  not  one 
violence  should  ever  be  attempted  on  our  physical 
sensations,  were  ’enough  of  itself  to  give  all  its 
anguish  to  the  worm  that  dieth  not,  to  sustain  in 
all  its  fierceness  the  fire  that  is  not  quenched. 

18.  And  this  may  lead  us  to  appreciate  that 
principle  which  has  been  advanced  by  certain 
writers  upon  morals,  that  Truth,  and  Justice,  and 
Benevolence,  and  all  the  other  moralities  derive 
their  virtue  from  their  subservience  to  utdity. 
'Pbey  make  the  usefulness  of  them  to  be  that  which 
constitutes  the  morality  of  them ;  or,  which  is  the 
same  thing,  that  all  their  worth  as  moial  viitues 
lies  in  their  being  useful.  Xow^  it  cannot  be  ques¬ 
tioned,  that,  in  the  existing  economy  of  things,  all 
of  them  are  indispensably  useful — that,  tor  example, 
without  such  a  general  truth  in  the  world  as  would 
greatly  preponderate  over  its  occasional  deceit  and 
falsehood,  there  could  be  no  Society,  no  commerce, 
none  of  the  beneficial  combinations  of  human  fel¬ 
lowship,  and  none  of  that  mutual  dependence  which 
hath  so  perfected  the  arts  and  the  arrangements 
of  human  industry.  It  is  well  that  the  gieat 
Architect  of  our  present  established  oidei,  hath  so 
devised  its  laws  and  its  processes,  as  that  virtue 
should  bring  many  blessings  and  felicities  in  its 
train.  But  this  is  a  concurrence  which  He  hath 
instituted,  and  may  certainly  be  regarded  as  His 
testimony  ou  the  side  of  moral  excellence,  ^sever- 
theless,  anterior  to  the  present  order,  these  virtues 
liaci  au  inherent  and  an  abiding  character  of  theii 
own.  It  so  is,  that  God  hath  superadded  to  the 


358  PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE. 

observation  of  truth  in  this  world,  many  resulting 
benefits,  which  would  he  altogether  done  away  by 
the  habitual  violation  of  it.  But  from  the  illus¬ 
trations  already  given,  it  may  be  seen,  that  the 
pleasure  we  have  in  the  benefits  is  altogether  dis¬ 
tinct  from  the  pleasure  that  we  primarily  and 
essentially  have  in  the  Virtue — and  that  our  feeling  of 
the  loss  incurred  by  its  violation,  is  altogether  dis¬ 
tinct  from  our  feeling  of  moral  recoil  and  repug¬ 
nance  at  the  violation  itself.  Before  this  world 
was  evolved  into  being.  Truth  formed  one  of  the 
residing  virtues  in  the  character  of  the  Godhead — 
whence  had  there  been  creatures  to  gaze  and  to 
admire,  it  would  have  beamed  in  unborrowed  love¬ 
liness  upon  them.  After  this  world  hath  become 
a  wreck,  we  know  not  what  the  new  ordinations 
will  be  of  the  System  that  arises  therefrom — or 
what  the  law  of  dependence  then,  between  the 
moralities  of  our  inward  character  and  the  felicities 
of  our  outward  condition.  We  know  that  here 
there  is  a  close  and  a  manifold  dependence ;  tiiat 
from  the  honesties  of  human  virtue,  there  is 
security  given  to  the  Labour  and  the  Enterprise 
which  create  all  the  sufficiencies  of  life ;  and  that 
from  its  humanities,  there  is  a  constant  discharse 
of  relief  upon  all  its  sufferings.  It  is  well  that  the 
world  is  so  constituted.  But  we  are  not,  in  the 
beneficial  effect  of  these  moralities,  to  overlook 
the  essential  charm  and  character  that  lie  in  the 
moralities  themselves — to  forget  that,  in  barely 
being  associated  and  having  to  do  with  deceit, 
there  is  a  misery  which  surpasses  that  of  all  the 
losses  which  arc  endured  by  it — and  that,  in  the 


PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE.  359 

very  sense  and  contact  of  human  sympathy,  there 
is  a  softening  balm  upon  the  heart  of  the  afflicted, 
distinct  altogether  from  the  gratifications  of  ap¬ 
peased  Hunger  or  of  alleviated  disease — that  these 
virtues  are  now  maturing  for  a  state  where  both 
Disease  and  Hunger  are  unknown  ;  and  that,  there¬ 
fore,  there  are  a  worth  and  a  stableness  about 
them,  fitted  to  survive  all  the  utilities  to  which 
now  they  are  subservient,  that,  if  simply  borne 
upward  with  these  moralities  to  Heaven,  we  carry 
the  best  elements  of  felicity  along  with  us — and 
that,  directly  and  without  the  intervention  of  con¬ 
sequences  at  all,  there  is  a  charm  in  the  felt  love 
that  is  met  with  there,  and  in  the  felt  sincerity 
that  is  tasted  there,  which  constitutes  by  far  the 
most  precious  of  Heaven’s  enjoyments. 

19.  There  are  innumerable  examples,  in  fami¬ 
liar  and  evei*y-day  life,  where  the  love  is  valued 
more  than  the  liberality  that  flows  from  it.  Why 
is  it  that  an  apple,  given  in  the  spirit  of  self- 
denial  and  of  kind  affection  to  a  parent  by  his  infant 
child,  is  a  hundred  fold  sweeter  than  an  apple  found 
by  him  upon  the  wayside  ?  It  is  because  of  the 
charm  wherewith  the  offering  is  impregnated.  The 
illustration  is  a  homily,  but  it  is  an  effective  one, 
and  may  lead  us  to  infer  that,  separate  from  all 
the  good  which  results  from  virtue,  there  is  also  a 
good  which  resides  in  virtue — that  there  is  a  some¬ 
thing  in  its  original  character,  that  fastens  one’s 
regard  upon  it,  independently  of  all  its  ultimate 
consequences,  however  beneficial  or  important  they 
might  turn  out  to  be — that  it  has  a  worth  in  itself, 
which  is  distinct  altogether  from  the  utility  of  its 


360  PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE, 

offices — and  that  it  were  utterly  vulgarizing  this 
noble  commodity  to  value  it  by  the  same  criterion 
that  we  should  do  a  tree  or  an  animal  or  an  article 
ol  household  furniture.  We  grant  that  truth  and 
piety  and  benevolence  are  all  most  highly  useful 
in  the  present  state  of  our  existence ; — and,  in  all 
the  relationship  of  life  and  business,  there  are 
manifold  advantages  which  might  be  demonstrated 
to  flow  from  them.  Still  it  is  not  as  gross  utili¬ 
tarianism  would  represent  it — it  is  not  the  profit 
of  virtue  whicli  constitutes  the  principle  of  virtue. 
It  has  a  direct,  and  we  may  add,  an  enduring  worth 
in  itself,  that  will  survive  all  the  existing  ari'ange- 
ments  of  society — and,  when  one  sees  so  palp¬ 
ably  of  kindness  for  example,  that,  whenever  a 
pure  gratitude  is  awakened,  it  is  more  valued  for 
its  own  good  than  for  all  the  good  that  it  does, 
one  must  look  to  more  than  its  utility  ere  they 
have  beheld  all  the  excellence  that  belongs  to  it. 

20.  The  leading  principle  of  this  disquisition  is 
very  well  expressed,  by  that  distinction  which  the 
ancients  made  between  the  utile  and  the  dulce  of 
virtue.  The  use  to  us  of  another’s  kindness  is  one 
thing — its  agreeableness  is  another.  It  is  natural 
to  love  it  for  the  sake  of  that  which  it  renders — 
but  it  is  a  far  higher  and  nobler  affection,  to  love  it 
for  its  own  sake.  In  the  spirit  of  a  mere  sordid 
appetency,  might  any  one  have  a  relish  for  the 
gifts — but  it  argues  a  more  ethereal  temperament 
of  the  soul,  when  the  main  relish  of  the  heart  is 
for  the  goodness  which  prompted  them.  lu 
prizing  virtue  because  of  its  uLile^  there  may  be 
nought  but  selfishness  and  the  grossness  of  material- 


PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE.  361 


ism.  In  prizing  it  because  of  the  didce^  there  is 
a  pure  moral  taste  undebased  by  the  feculence  of 
earthly  desires  or  earthly  enjoyments.  The  most 
degraded  ot  the  species  will  join  me  in  the  legard 
that  I  have  for  the  substantial  present,  for  the 
meat  or  the  money  that  has  been  awarded  by  the 
liberality  of  a  friend.  But  it  is  a  still  higher 
satisfaction  to  be  the  object  of  friendship,  though 
there  should  be  no  lorthcomiug  of  liberality  out  of 
it— simply  to  have  another’s  love,  though  we  never 
once  should  partake  ol  his  largesses — to  know  that 
his  every  thought  of  us  was  a  thought  of  kindness, 
although,  in  the  circumstances  of  our  intercourse, 
the  deeds  or  the  observations  of  kindness  were  un¬ 
called  for — just  to  be  assiu'ed  that  there  was  au 
affinity  of  tendeimess  in  the  heart  towards  ns, 
although  his  hand  should  never  have  occasion  to 
be  opened  for  our  relief  or  to  be  lifted  up  in  our 
service.  It  is  this  pure  action  and  reaction  of 
soul  wdth  soul — it  is  this  law  of  moral  reciprocity 
which  obtains  between  one  human  bosom  and 
another— it  is  the  radiance  of  good  will  from  the 
first,  calling  back  the  reflection  of  gratitude  from 
the  second— and  all  this,  it  may  be,  without  an  act 
of  common  bounty  to  vulgarize  it,  or  to  cast  a 
shade  of  doubtfulness  on  the  glorious  truth,  that 
there  may  be  enjoyment,  even  unto  ecstasy,  in  the 
pure  play  of  the  spirit  and  nothing  else— these  are 
the  views  which  exalt  virtue  above  all  economic 
and  all  political  computation,  and  which  demon¬ 
strate,  that,  apart  from  the  good  of  its  consequences 
altogether,  there  is  a  good  in  itselt  that  weie 
enough  to  sustain  the  beatitude  of  iramortal  spirits^ 
vov.  V,  Q 


362  PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE. 

aud  to  cause  that  the  joys  of  heaven  should  be 
full. 

21.  Dr.  Smith’s  theory  applies  alike  to  the 
emotions  of  gratitude  and  anger — though  it  is  not» 
as  he  would  have  it,  the  sympathy  of  the  third  or 
disinterested  party — it  is  not  this  which  originates 
the  moral  approbation  ;  but  the  moral  approbation 
which  originates  the  sympathy.  It  is  not  the 
sympathy  which  causes  our  judgment,  but  the 
judgment  on  prior  and  independent  principles 
which  causes  our  sympathy.  Still  it  may  be  true, 
that,  if  an  impartial  spectator  sympathize  with  the 
anger  of  one  of  the  parties,  that  is  the  party  who 
is  in  the  right — not  right,  however,  because  sym¬ 
pathized  with ;  but  right  antecedently,  and 
therefore  sympathized  with.  It  is  well,  however, 
that  Di’.  Smith  hath  brought  out  this  sympathy  to 
such  prominent  notice,  for  it  is  the  effect,  and  so 
the  indication,  of  our  moral  approval,  though  not 
the  cause  of  it.  And  the  situation  which  he 
assigns  to  him,  whose  sympathy  he  regards  as  the 
cause  of  our  moral  judgments,  is  in  the  highest 
degree  favourable  to  the  rightness  of  the  mora). 
judgment  itself.  It  is  a  situation  of  complete  im¬ 
partiality.  It  is  that,  neither  of  the  one  nor  other 
of  the  parties  between  whom  it  is  so  apt  to  become 
a  contest  of  selfishness,  but  that  of  a  spectator 
looking  calmly  on  and  submitting  himself  unwarped 
and  unaffected  to  the  impression  of  the  scene  that 
is  acting:  before  his  eves.  His  is  a  far  likelier 
condition  for  a  fair  judgment  of  the  case,  than  that 
cf  either  the  aggressor,  whose  attention  is  centreu 
on  the  desirableness  of  that  which  hath  moved  nim. 


PHENOMENA  OF  ANGEIl  AND  GRATITUDE.  363 


to  hls  aggression ;  or  that  of  the  offended  party, 
who  sensitive  and  all  aliv^e  to  his  own  interest,  hath 
his  attention  far  more  tenaciously  fixed  on  the  out¬ 
rage  viewed  in  relation  to  his  own  suffering,  than 
viewed  in  relation  to  the  precise  amount  of  its  delin- 
quency.  The  one  under-rates  j  the  othei  over-iates 
the  wrong.  Whereas  an  impartial  spectator,  sub¬ 
ject  as  he  is  neither  to  the  one  bias  nor  to  the 
other,  forms  a  correct  estimate  of  the  real  merits 
of  the  case.  It  is  thus  that  his  sympathy  is  correct ; 
but  just  because  his  judgment  is  correct.  The 
sympathy  is  not  anterior  to  the  moral  judgment — 
the  moral  judgment  is  anterior  to  the  sympathy. 

22.  We  are  conscious  how  opposite  the  two 
emotions  of  anger  and  gratitude  are  to  each  other 
_ and  there  is  just  as  widely  contrasted  an  opposi¬ 
tion,  between  the  causes  of  this  emotion.  He  who 
seizes  upon  that  which  belongs  to  me  rouses  me  to 
anger.  Irle  who  freely  bestows  upon  me  that  which 
belongs  to  himself  wins  me  to  gratitude.  The  impar¬ 
tial  spectator  w  ho  sympathizes  with  my  resentment, 
charges  injustice  upon  him  who  is  the  object  of  it, 
and  condemns  him  accordingly.  The  impartial 
spectator  who  sympathizes  with  my  gratitude, 
renders  the  credit  of  beneficence  to  him  who  is  the 
object  of  it,  and  applauds  him  accordingly.  But 
neither  here  is  it  the  sympathy  which  hath  caused 
the  moral  judgment;  but  the  moral  judgment  w'hicn 
hath  caused  the  sympathy.  The  man  is  recognised 
anteriorly  and  directly,  as  one  who  desel^es  the 
praise  of  beneficence — and  so  the  gratitude  of  him 
who  is  the  object  of  it,  is  at  one  with  the  compla¬ 
cency  of  him  who  is  the  approving  w  itness. 


364  PHENOMENA  OF  ANGER  AND  GRATITUDE. 

23.  As  an  impai’tial  spectator  often  refuses  hia 
sympathy  to  the  anger  of  another — so  may  he  also 
refuse  his  sympathy  to  the  gratitude.  It  is  true 
that  we  are  more  liable  to  err  in  the  excess  of  the 
first  emotion — while  our  error,  in  regard  to  the 
second,  is  more  generally  one  of  short-coming  or 
deficiency.  We  may  lie  open  to  reproval  both 
because  of  our  extreme  sensibility  to  injustice, 
and  our  extreme  insensibility  to  favour.  In  both 
cases  a  fair  looker  on  will  refuse  to  us  his  sympathy. 
He  can  neither  enter  into  the  violence  of  our 
resentment,  nor  into  the  languor  of  our  gratitude. 
It  is  when  our  feelings  and  his  judgments  keep  equal 
pace,  the  one  with  the  other,  that  the  mau  who  is 
the  object  of  my  anger  is  the  object  of  his  moral 
blame,  because  of  the  injustice  that  he  hath  com¬ 
mitted — and  that  the  man  who  is  the  object  of  my 
gratitude,  is  also  the  object  of  his  moral  esteem, 
for  the  beneficence  that  he  hath  rendered. 

24.  It  may  sometimes  happen,  how^ever,  that 
my  gratitude  may  outrun  his  sympathy  by  its  ex¬ 
cess — so  that  he  cannot  follow  it  up  by  any  thing 
like  a  commensurate  approbation.  The  man  who 
hath  capriciously,  and  without  any  ground  for  such 
a  preference,  singled  me  out  as  the  object  of  some 
whimsical  and  extravagant  liberality,  might  cause 
the  grateful  respondency  of  my  feelings,  while  he 
rather  provokes  the  derision  and  perhaps  the  cen¬ 
sure  of  impartial  spectators.  It  may  be  felt  as  an 
exhibition  of  disgusting  favouritism.  And  certain 
it  is  that  the  man  who  is  so  far  blinded  by  personal 
obligations  as  to  vindicate  an  otherwise  worthless 
benefactor,  whp  will  plead  his  cause  against  the 


PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION.  365 

world,  and  say  of  him  that  whatever  the  public 
may  allege,  he  has  always  stood  my  friend,  and 
been  the  consistent  and  unwearied  benefactor  of 
my  family — his  gratitude  will  not  be  sustained  as 
authority  for  the  moral  estimate  of  others.  And 
this  proves  that  their  principles  of  judgment  have 
an  authority  of  their  own,  apart  from  the  emotions 
of  either  gratitude  on  the  one  hand,  or  of  anger 
upon  the  other — but  which,  when  coincident  with 
these,  gives  the  sanction  of  a  high  and  righteous 

approval  unto  both _ On  the  whole  Dr.  Smith  has 

not  succeeded  as  the  founder  of  a  philosophical 
theory  in  morals.  The  sympathy  that  he  would 
represent  as  the  cause  of  our  moral  judgments,  is 
in  truth  the  effect  of  them.  It  may  be  regarded 
as  a  test  of  the  morality  of  actions,  but  not  as  its 
principle ;  and  that  sense  of  right  and  wrong,  which 
he  would  educe  by  a  process  of  manufacture  from 
certain  anterior  feelings,  has  itself  the  rank  of  a 
primary  in  the  human  constitution — having  an  in¬ 
dependent  place  of  its  own,  in  the  original  and  un- 
ierived  part  of  our  nature. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

On  the  Duties  of  Perfect  and  Imperfect  Obligation. 

1.  Justice  and  beneficence  are  two  virtues  as  dis¬ 
tinct  from  each  other,  as  are  the  emotions  of  anger 
and  gratitude,  wherewkh  they  are  related.  Only, 
to  make  this  clearly  out,  it  should  be  remembered 


366  PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION. 

that  each  emotion  stands  related  to  its  counterpart 
virtue  in  a  different,  or  rather  an  opposite  way,  the 
one  from  the  other.  In  the  case  of  beneficence, 
it  is  the  virtue  itself  which  awakens  the  gratitude. 
In  the  case  of  justice,  it  is,  not  the  virtue,  but  the 
violation  of  it  which  awakens  anger — so  that  to 
learn  of  the  distinction  between  these  two  virtues, 
from  the  distinction  between  the  two  emotions,  the 
proper  test,  is,  not  to  compare  the  emotions  awaken¬ 
ed  first  by  the  fulfilment  of  the  former  and  secondly 
by  the  infraction  of  the  latter — but  to  compare  the 
way  in  which  we  are  affected,  whether  by  the  two 
fulfilments  only,  or  by  the  two  infractions  only. 
The  fulfilment  of  beneficence  towards  us  calls  forth 
gratitude;  but  not  so  the  fulfilment  of  justice. 
We  do  not  thank  a  man  for  paying  what  he  owes 
to  us,  as  we  should  for  a  donation  given  of  his  own 
generous  free  will,  and  to  which  w  e  had  no  title  ; 
and  neither  are  we  angry  at  a  man,  because  he 
has  not  made  us  a  present,  or  invited  us  to  an 
entertainment,  as  we  should  be  angry  at  him  for 
an  act  of  fraud,  or  an  act  of  violence — for  an  undue 
freedom  either  with  our  person,  or  with  our  pro¬ 
perty.  These  are  the  phenomena  of  our  nature 
which,  do  not  constitute,  but  which  mark,  a  real 
distinction  between  the  virtue  of  humanity  or 
beneficence  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  virtue  of 
justice  on  the  other. 

2.  And  yet,  there  are  apparent  anomalies,  w  hich 
serve  to  obscure  this  distinction,  and  which,  if  not 
explained,  might  dispose  the  student  of  moral 
science  to  confound  these  two  virtues,  or  at  least 
to  graduate  the  one  into  the  other.  Anger,  we 


PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION.  367 


have  already  said,  when  rightly  felt,  is  that  emo¬ 
tion,  which  follows  the  infringement  of  one  virtue, 
even  justice  ;  and  gratitude  is  that  emotion  w'hich 
follows,  not  the  infringement  of  another  viitue, 
but  the  virtue  itself,  even  beneficence.  It  is  thus 
that  nature  furnishes  landmarks,  in  the  instinctive 
principles  of  our  own  constitution,  by  which  to 
distinguish  one  morality  from  another;  and  the 
guidance  thus  afforded  would  have  been  a  clear 
and  unerring  guidance,  had  it  not  been  for  those 
anomalies  in  the  emotion  of  anger  to  which  w^e 
have  now  adverted.  1  he  truth  is,  that  no  further 
explanation  would  have  been  necessary,  if  they 
were  only  the  violations  of  justice  which  had  been 
at  all  times  the  objects  of  an  approved  anger — and 
if  this  emotion  had  not  been  both  suddenly  excited, 
and  even  soberly  and  deliberately  sympathized 
w'ith,  on  certain  violations  of  beneficence  also. 
This  has  gone  far  to  obscure  the  line  of  demarca¬ 
tion  between  these  two  moralities,  and  so  given 
rise  to  very  hurtful  errors  in  the  practice  of  legis¬ 
lation. 

3.  Let  us  suppose  one  to  meet  with  some  acci¬ 
dent  by  the  wayside,  such  as  a  tall  from  his  horse, 
that  laid  him  helpless  and  bleeding  upon  the 
ground;  and  that  a  passenger  approached,  who, 
both  saw  his  distress  and  heard  his  piteous  and 
imploring  cry.  We  might  farther  imagine  of  this 
person,  that  he  was  one  whom  the  sufferer  had 
formerly  distinguished  by  some  very  important  act 
of  friendship  and  liberality.  This  would  be  a  case 
cf  anger  excited  by  the  violation  of  giatitude, 
wiiicir  we  shall  afterwards  explain.  But  even 


368  PERFECT  AND  IMFERFECl'  OBLIGATION. 

though  there  never  had  any  favour  been  bestowed 
upon  him,  though  he  were  an  utter  stranger  and 
only  related  to  the  other  by  the  common  tie  of  a 
fellow  of  the  species — still  the  cold-blooded  indif¬ 
ference  wherewith  he  moved  along  without  an 
effort  or  an  expression  of  sympathy  on  his  part, 
this  barbarous  neglect  were  enough  to  irritate  the 
unhappy  object  of  it,  and  to  call  forth  the  silent 
execration  of  an  indignant  heart — a  feeling  this, 
which  would  be  fully  sympathized  with  by  others, 
and  so  the  public  resentment  would  be  quite  at  one 
with  personal  resentment,  and  that  against  a  viola¬ 
tion  of  beneficence. 

4.  To  account  for  this  it  might  be  enough  to 
remark  that,  whatever  of  attention  or  indulgence 
or  aid  is  common  in  society  from  one  man  to 
another,  is  the  object  of  general  expectation  among 
all — and  every  man  feels  that  to  be  part  of  his 
property,  which  he  regularly  counts  upon.  A  very 
familiar  instance  of  this  might  be  quoted  in  the 
relation  between  a  master  and  his  servant — where 
we  might  suppose  all  the  duties  on  the  one  side, 
and  all  the  allowances  on  the  other,  to  be  provided 
for  by  express  stipulation.  Should  the  master,  in 
pure  kindness  for  his  domestic,  dispense  for  a  few 
days  with  one  of  the  specified  hours  of  work,  and 
at  length,  though  without  any  rescinding  of  the 
old  terms  of  the  bargain,  slip  into  the  habit  of 
doing  so  for  a  month  together — or  should  he,  on 
the  same  feeling,  make,  upon  a  few  occasions,  the 
allowance  of  some  additional  luxury  to  one  of  the 
meals,  and  insensibly  fall  into  a  regular  practice 
of  it  for  the  same  period — it  will  be  perceived  that 


PERFECT  AND  IMPERFEC1'  OCLIGATION.  3C0 


Beneficence  originated  both  the  one  and  the  other 
of  these  liberalities ;  and  we  have  no  doubt  that 
gratitude  would,  in  the  first  instance,  be  awakened 
by  each  of  them.  And  further,  had  they  not  been 
so  long  persisted  in,  had  they  been  speedily  re¬ 
sumed  and  again  come  forth  in  the  same  random 
and  unexpected  style  afterwards,  they  still  would 
have  been  felt  as  expressions  of  kindness  and,  been 
received  with  thankfulness  accordingly.  But  when, 
instead  of  this,  they  are  established  into  a  uniform 
and  customary  practice — that  very  circumstance 
transforms  what  was  originally  a  favour,  into  a 
matter  of  rightful  expectation.  The  constant  re¬ 
petition  of  it  has  had  somewhat  the  effect  of  a 
promise  on  the  mind  of  the  servant,  in  leading  him 
to  look  forward  to  that  of  which  his  experience  Inis 
taught  him  how  surely  and  regularly  it  casts  u]), 
on  the  coming  round  of  the  proper  occasion  for  it 
— and  it  is  at  length  felt  by  him,  as  laying  some¬ 
thing  like  the  obligation  of  a  promise  upon  tlie 
master.  It  is  thus,  that,  what  had  purely  the 
character  of  a  thing  of  beneficence  at  tlie  outset, 
might  terminate  in  a  thing  of  justice,  'llie  rig'nt 
of  what  in  Scotch  law  is  termed  “  use  and  wont,” 
comes  in  time  to  be  attached  to  it.  So  that  should 
it  be  discontinued,  though  it  never  was  a  maitcr 
of  bargain,  and  only  came  into  a  habit  from  a  b  ee 
impulse  of  benevolence — there  is  anger  excited  in 
the  bosom  of  the  deprived  party,  as  if  a  positive 
outrage  had  been  rendered  to  him.  He  by  this  time 
has  acquired  the  feeling  of  a  possessory  right — and 
thus  might  we  explain  how  an  emotion,  that  seems 
proper  only  to  an  injury  that  has  been  inflicted, 

Q  2 


370  PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION. 

might  be  powerfully  and  instantly  awakened  in  the 
heart,  even  upon  a  mere  kindness  being  withheld. 

5.  This  is  the  reason  why  we  often  find  liberal 
and  indulgent  people,  explaining  most  anxiously 
to  their  dependents,  the  difterence  between  a  matter 
of  kindness  and  a  matter  of  claim — and  forewarn¬ 
ing  them,  upon  the  granting  of  every  spontaneous 
allowance,  that  it  may  at  any  time  be  recalled.  It  is 
not  that  they  mean  to  recall  it.  It  is  not  even  that 
they  might  set  forth  ostentatiously  their  own  bene¬ 
volence.  But  it  is  for  the  positive  comfort  of 
having  gratitude  on  all  those  occasions  where  grati¬ 
tude  is  due — and  more  especially  that  they  might 
not,  as  a  return  for  their  own  aifectionate  good¬ 
will,  be  exposed  to  the  mortifying  sensation,  in  a 
matter  of  pure  generosity,  of  those  jealous  and 
angry  feelings  that  get  round  a  matter  of  justice, 
for  the  purpose  either  of  assisting  or  guarding  it. 
It  is  very  hard,  if,  by  a  kindness  which  ought  to 
cement  and  conciliate  human  hearts,  we  should 
multiply  the  topics  of  future  animosity  ;  and  there¬ 
fore  it  is  most  natural  and  right,  to  prevent  this 
by  a  clear  understanding  between  ourselves  and 
the  objects  of  our  beneficence — and  one  of  the 
most  powerful  ingredients  of  popularity,^  either 
with  a  master  among  the  domestics  of  his  own 
household  or  with  a  master  among  the  workmen 
of  a  great  trading  establishment,  is  that  wise  and 
judicious  tact,  which  might  enable  him  to  manage 
aright  the  delicacies  of  that  ambiguous  ground, 
which  lies  between  justice  on  the  one  side  and 
liberality  on  the  other. 

6.  But  what  we  at  present  wish  to  ascertaiu  is, 


PEKFECT  AND  IMPEllFECT  OBLIGATION.  371 

why  a  gross  violation  of  beneficence  on  the  part 
even  of  a  mere  stranger,  should  provoke  wrath — 
wlien,  in  fact,  the  proper  object  of  wrath  is  a  vio¬ 
lation  of  justice.  When  he  has  merely  neglected 
me,  w'hy  do  I  feel  towards  him  as  if  he  had  injuied 
me.  If  he  had  merely  inflicted  a  blow,  I  can 
understand  the  consequent  anger  that  would  be 
felt  upon  the  occurrence.  But  why  should  I  be 
angry  against  him,  for  refusing  when  he  saw  me 
Iving  bruised  and  languid  at  his  feet,  to  bind  up 
the  wounds  that  had  been  inflicted  by  the  blows  of 
others.  Is  not  this  to  be  angry  at  an  offence,  not 
against  justice  but  for  a  failure  from  mere  benefi¬ 
cence  ?  and  is  not  this  a  testimony  by  the  voice  of 
nature,  to  the  similitude  of  those  two  virtues, 
which  we  are  wont  to  characterize  as  altogether 
distinct  the  one  from  the  other  ? 

7.  And  we  do  think  them  nearly  as  distinct,  as 
the  two  emotions  of  auger  and  gratitude  are— though 
the  one  be  excited  by  the  violation  of  the  first  of 
these  moralities,  and  the  other  by  the  exercise  of 
the  second.  And  as  to  those  cases  when  the  vio¬ 
lation  of  beneliceuce  moves  to  anger,  it  admits, 
we  apprehend,  of  the  very  explanation  that  vve 
gave  of  a  servant’s  anger — when  his  master  either 
suspended  or  withdrew  some  wonted  indulgence, 
which  he  had  long  been  in  the  habit  of  making, 
though  never  legally  under  the  obligation  of  doing 
so.  The  servant,  at  length,  acquires  the  feeling 
of  a  possessory  right  to  it — and  lie  is  angry  when 
it  is  withheld,  just  because  he  feels  that  he  has 
been  injured.  lie  could  not  plead  the  matter  at 
law,  because  it  formed  none  of  the  articles  ci*  sti- 


372  PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION, 


pulations  of  his  bond — yet  this  does  not  prevent 
the  impression  in  his  own  mind,  of  an  arbitrary 
violation  on  the  part  of  his  superior,  of  a  sort  of 
tacit  engagement  ratified  by  long  usage,  if  not  an 
express  engagement  ratified  by  the  forms  of  a  regu¬ 
lar  covenant.  He  had  been  led  to  expect  the 
indulgence  in  question,  just  because  he  had  long 
been  accustomed  to  it — and  so  too  there  is  a 
certain  average  beneficence,  which  experience 
teaches  us  to  expect  of  every  body.  There  is  a 
kind  of  current  and  every-day  humanity,  that  all, 
with  very  few  exceptions,  render  to  all — such  as 
returning  the  salutations  of  civility  ;  or  satisfying 
any  discreet  and  pertinent  inquiry  made  by  the 
wayfarer ;  or,  more  especially,  and  above  all, 
lending  ready  succour  to  some  prostrate  sufferer 
who  hath  been  overtaken  by  sickness  or  accident. 
This  is  commonly  given — and  therefore  as  com¬ 
monly  counted  upon.  Each  holds  it  as  a  kind  of 
possessory  right  upon  all  his  fellows — not  a  right 
that  can  be  litigated  certainly,  but  a  right  that 
Nature  challenges,  and  which  Nature  also  resents 
when  the  challenge  is  not  yielded  to.  And  so  it 
is,  that,  when  one  meets  with  more  than  the  ave¬ 
rage  attentions  which  circulate  through  society 
from  one  human  being  to  another,  he  feels  a  dis¬ 
tinct  gratitude — when  he  receives  just  the  average 
attentions,  his  gratitude  does  not  rise  higher  than 
to  the  tone  of  an  ordinary  companionable  feeling — 
but  when  his  treatment  is  below  par,  when  in 
circumstances  of  great  distress  he  has  been  barba¬ 
rously  neglected  and  turned  away  from,  he  feels 
as  keen  a  resentmev.t  at  the  thought  of  it,  as  he 


PEnFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION.  373 


would  at  some  outrage  of  barbarity  which  had 
been  actually  and  positively  inflicted  upon  him. 
In  this  anger,  he  is  backed  by  the  indignation  of 
all  his  acquaintances — and,  what  with  the  irrita¬ 
tion  that  the  man  hath  brought  upon  himself  who 
has  egregiously  failed  in  one  of  the  common  offices 
of  humanity,  and  what  with  the  moral  antipathy 
that  is  always  felt  against  such  a  character — there 
is  such  a  reaction  of  odium  and  of  popular  disdain 
called  forth  by  any  such  rare  or  monstrous  barba¬ 
rity,  as  constitutes  its  best  punishment,  and  forms 
our  best  security  against  the  frequent  occurrence 
of  it  in  society. 

8.  So  much  are  we  persuaded  of  the  truth  of 
this  explanation,  that  we  have  no  doubt  it  might 
be  verified  by  the  comparison  of  one  country  with 
another.  We  know  that  the  standard  of  humanity 
varies  in  different  countries — that  the  kindnesses 
that  are  currently  practised  in  one  place,  are  never 
done  in  another,  and  therefore  never  counted  upon  ; 
and,  accordingly,  we  venture  to  assert,  that,  in  the 
former  place,  the  refusal  of  these  kindnesses  would 
excite  a  lively  indignation,  which,  in  the  latter 
place,  would  not  be  felt.  We  have  often  heard  of 
the  hospitality  that  obtains  in  the  Highlands  of 
Scotland;  and  that  in  Switzerland  this  generous 
habit  is  comparatively  unknown — and  we  have 
therefore  no  doubt,  that,  the  same  refusal  which 
would  constitute  a  provocation  in  the  first,  would 
scarcely  be  felt  as  one  in  the  second ;  and  certainly, 
if  felt,  would  not  be  sympathized  with.  Wherever 
the  general  expectation  of  hospitality  hath  gen¬ 
dered  the  feeling  as  of  a  possessory  right  to  it. 


374  PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION. 

then,  on  annoyance  being  rendered  to  this  feeling, 
resentment  is  awakened.  But  should  one  be  over¬ 
taken  with  a  midnight  storm,  in  a  country  where 
this  virtue  is  wholly  unknown,  and  where  perhaps 
the  suspicion  of  treachery  or  the  fears  of  violence 
have  steeled  the  hearts  of  men  against  each  other 
— the  refusal  of  admittance  wmuld  simply  be  felt 
as  an  aggravation  of  our  lot;  and  might  excite 
almost  as  little  of  indignancy  in  our  bosom,  as 
would  any  of  the  physical  aggravations  of  our  con¬ 
dition,  such  as  the  inclemency  of  the  weather,  or 
the  hazardous  and  impracticable  state  of  the  roads 
for  travelling.  We  have  heard  that  in  Italy,  more 
especially  in  its  Southern  provinces,  the  most 
piteous  spectacles  on  the  w'ay-side  are  habitually 
disregarded — that  a  man,  for  example,  might  be 
lying  in  the  agonies  of  hunger,  when,  without  an 
effort  or  an  inclination  to  relieve  him,  he  is  suffered 
to  perish.  We  think  that  anger  would  not  so  pre¬ 
dominate  among  his  other  emotions  of  painfulness, 
as  it  wmuld  in  the  heart  of  him  who,  in  similar  cir¬ 
cumstances,  w'as  neglected  in  like  manner  in  one 
of  our  Scottish  parishes.  We  trust  that  these 
illustrations  will  suffice,  for  clearing  away  that 
obscurity  wffiich  might  otherwise  have  rested  on 
the  margin  that  lies  between  the  tw'o  virtues  of 
Beneficence  and  Justice — to  show  that  there  really 
is  a  point  at  which  gratitude  ends,  and  anger  begins 
— and  that  this  point  marks  as  it  were  whereabout 
lies  the  commencement,  not  of  the  right  which  can 
be  litigated,  but  of  the  right  which  every  one  feels 
himself  as  a  man  in  possession  of  to  the  common 
if  humanity. 


PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION.  375 

9.  The  difference  between  one  country  and 
another,  suggests  to  us  the  effect  that  ensues  on 
the  humanizing  of  a  population.  By  raising  their 
average  character,  we  elevate  the  point  to  which 
the  common  beneficence  is  carried ;  and,  in  th.iit 
proportion,  do  we  raise  the  expectations  that  men 
in  general  will  have  of  aid  or  kindness  or  civility 
from  others,  in  any  given  circumstances  of  neces¬ 
sity  or  suffering.  The  every-day  rate  of  courtesy 
between  man  and  man  becomes  higher  than  before 
_ and  he  who  acts  up  to  this  rate  sustains  a  pas¬ 
sable  character  among  his  fellows ;  while  he  who 
falls  beneath  it,  not  only  incurs  the  resentment  of 
those  with  whom  he  immediately  deals,  but  brings 
down  upon  himself  the  odium  of  Society.  It  is 
the  office  of  Law  to  guard  the  property  of  each 
individual  from  all  encroachments  on  it  by  others 
— and  so  it  stands  accurately  at  the  margin  be¬ 
tween  beneficence  and  justice.  But,  superadded 
to  this,  there  is  a  sort  of  virtual  Law,  that  hath 
the  Sanctions,  not  of  political  authority,  but  of 
public  opinion  to  uphold  it,  and  which  operates  on 
the  fear  of  disgrace  or  the  fear  of  indignation — and 
so  visits  with  very  effective  penalties,  those  who 
fall  short  of  that  ordinary  beneficence  which  obtains 
in  Society,  and  which,  because  generally  practised, 
is  also  generally  looked  for.  It  is  evident  that  in 
this  way,  there  is  a  powerful  operation  of  Nature, 
by  which  something  more  than  rigid  justice  is 
gained  to  Society — an  operation  which  extends 
beyond  that  precise  and  definable  limit,  where  Law 
lets  down  the  exercise  of  its  functions,  and  which 
will  extend  further  in  proportion  to  the  degree 


37G  PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION. 


whereunto  the  general  humanity  of  a  nation  has 
been  exalted.  It  is  thus  that  from  the  region  of 
Beneficence,  there  has  been  reclaimed  a  border, 
which  commences  at  the  line  of  demarcation  be¬ 
tween  itself  and  strict  Justice ;  and  which  varies 
in  its  breadth  in  various  countries,  according  to 
the  virtue  or  goodness  of  the  people.  On  this 
space  lie  all  the  common  courtesies  and  humanities 
of  life,  which  Law  either  does  not  or  ought  not  to 
compel;  and  against  the  violation  of  which,  the 
salutary,  and  in  general  the  sufficient  checks,  are 
the  personal  hostility  and  the  public  hatred  that 
w’ould  be  incurred  by  it.  It  is  thus  that  the  map, 
as  it  were,  of  human  conduct,  may  be  regarded  as 
consisting  of  three  distinct  parts.  There  is  first 
the  region  of  injustice — on  which  if  a  man  is  found. 
Law  apprehends  him,  and  visits  wdth  her  penalties. 
There  is  secondly  the  region  of  common-place 
beneficence — which  if  a  man  fully  occupies,  he  is 
tolerated  and  received  in  Society;  but  which  if  he 
do  not,  even  though  never  caught  on  the  side  of 
injustice,  though  never  overtaken  by  the  condem¬ 
nation  of  Law',  because  he  always  keeps  his  rigid 
and  unviolable  place  in  the  margin  that  has  been 
defined  by  her,  yet  will  he  be  surely  overtaken  by 
the  loud  censures  of  an  indignant  public.  And  - 
lastly,  there  is  the  higher  region  of  Beneficence — 
on  which  whensoever  he  enters,  he  meets  with 
grateful  welcome,  with  testimonies  of  public  esteem, 
and  the  plaudits  of  his  approving  neighbourhood. 

10.  We  may  now  piiluips  understand  more 
clearly  the  place  that  gratitude  ought  to  have 
among  the  moralities  (jf  h.mrum  virtiu'.  It  ought 


PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBEKiAMON.  7  , 

not  to  be  so  ranked  with  justice,  as  that  its  vio¬ 
lation  shall  be  made  a  prosecutable  offence ;  or 
that  the  observance  of  it  shall  be  guarded  and 
guaranteed  by  legal  penalties.  Neither  ought  it 
to  have  a  place  in  that  higher  region  of  Bene¬ 
ficence,  where  it  might  be  hailed  by  the  acknow¬ 
ledgments  that  are  only  due  to  those  who  do  more 
than  is  expected  or  claimed;  or  Avho  signalize 
themselves  by  that  spontaneous  well-doing,  which 
is  of  a  higher  character  than  the  average  humanity 
of  our  world.  Gratitude  is  a  thing  expected  by 
a  benefactor ;  and  is  of  such  regular  expectation 
that,  when  withheld  from  any  one,  he  feels  as  if 
defrauded,  not  of  a  legal,  but  a  possessory  right. 
He  is  made  to  suffer  under  the  infliction  of  a  pain 
which  he  did  not  lay  his  account  with.  It  is  thus 
that  resentment  comes  on  the  back  of  ingratitude ; 
and  the  emotion  is  re-echoed  by  tbe  indignation  of 
all  the  impartial  by-standers.  Those  are  the  na¬ 
tural  penalties  of  ingratitude  ;  and  no  others  should 
be  devised  against  it.  To  enact,  we  shall  not  say, 
the  feelings,  for  this  were  a  vain  enterprise ;  but 
to  enact  the  deeds  or  the  offerings  of  gratitude  by 
Law,  would  be,  not  to  enforce  the  claims  of  Bene¬ 
ficence,  but  positively  to  cancel  them.  There  is 
no  gratitude  due,  when  a  man’s  beneficence  is 
prompted  by  the  expectation  of  a  retuim,  for  which 
lie  can  plea  and  prosecute  before  a  tribunal  of 
justice.  So  that  if  we  wish  to  keep  up  in  Society 
the  play  of  a  beneficence  on  the  one  side  and  gra¬ 
titude  on  the  other — this  gratitude  must  also  be 
left  free.  The  application  of  a  legal  force  to  it 
would  mar  the  generosity  of  the  giver — who  could 


378  PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION. 


not  but  feel  that  while  awarding  relief  to  another, 
he  was  building  up  a  right  for  himself ;  and,  in  that 
very  proportion,  would  it  chill  and  wither  the 
Gratitude  which  it  vainly  meant  to  uphold  in  the 
warmth  of  its  sensibilities  and  in  the  activity  of  its 
services.  This,  if  any  thing,  proves  the  necessity 
of  an  intermediate  ground,  upon  which  law  must 
not  enter  to  force  the  proprieties  of  human  conduct 
— even  though  they  be  such  proprieties  as,  if 
violated  or  disregarded,  would  call  forth  the  keen¬ 
est  and  most  piercing  execrations  of  human  Society. 
To  these  execrations  all  the  offences  in  question 
ought  to  be  left — and  we  from  this  perceive,  how 
that  which  is  called  jurisprudence  might  be  carried 
to  a  most  imprudent  length,  and  how,  by  the  excess 
of  its  officious  and  ill-timed  regulations,  it  might 
thwart  the  most  wholesome  provisions  of  Nature 
both  for  the  worth  and  well-being  of  our  species. 

11.  Dr.  Adam  Smith,  in  his  Theory  of  Moral 
Sentiments,  adverts  in  the  following  passages, 
both  to  the  existence  of  those  moralities  which 
occupiy  this  intermediate  ground  between  justice 
and  beneficence,  and  thereby  partake  of  the  charac¬ 
ter  of  both ;  and  also  to  the  hurtful  effects  that 
might  arise  from  the  attempt  to  enforce  their  ob¬ 
servation  by  law — “  We  must  always  however 
carefully  distinguish  what  is  only  blameable  or  the 
proper  object  of  disapprobation,  from  what  force 
may  be  employed  either  to  punish  or  to  prevent. 
That  seems  blameable,  which  falls  short  of  that 
ordinary  degree  of  proper  beneficence,  which  ex¬ 
perience  teaches  us  to  expect  of  any  body;  and, 
on  the  contrar}",  that  seems  praiseworthy  which 


PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION.  379 

goes  beyond  it.  The  ordinary  degree  itself  seems 
neither  blameable  nor  praiseworthy.  A  father,  a 
son,  a  brother,  who  behaves  to  the  correspondent 
relation  neither  better  nor  worse  than  the  greater 
part  of  men  commonly  do,  seems  properly  to  deserve 
neither  praise  nor  blame.  He  who  surprises  us 
by  extraordinary  and  unexpected,  though  still  pro¬ 
per  and  suitable  kindness,  or,  on  the  contrary,  by 
extraordinary  and  unexpected  as  well  as  unsuitable 
unkindness,  seems  praiseworthy  in  the  one  case  and 
blameable  in  the  other.” — “  Even  tlie  most  ordinary 
degree  of  kindness  or  beneficence,  however,  cannot 
among  equals  be  extorted  by  fine.  Among  equals 
each  individual  is,  naturally  and  antecedent  to  the 
constitution  of  civil  government,  regarded  as  having 
a  right  both  to  defend  himself  from  injuries,  and 
to  exact  a  certain  degree  of  punishment  for  those 
which  have  been  done  to  him.  Every  generous 
spectator  not  only  approves  ol  his  conduct  when 
he  does  this  ;  but  enters  so  fully  into  his  sentiments 
as  often  to  be  willing  to  assist  him.  When  one 
man  attacks  or  robs  or  attempts  to  murder  another, 
all  the  neighbours  take  the  alarm ;  and  think  that 
they  do  right  wlien  they  run,  either  to  revenge  the 
person  who  has  been  injured,  or  to  defend  him 
who  is  in  danger  of  being  so.  But  when  a  father 
fails  in  the  ordinary  degree  of  parental  affection 
towards  a  son;  when  a  son  seems  to  want  that 
filial  reverence  which  might  be  expected  to  his 
father;  when  brothers  are  without  the  usual  de¬ 
gree  of  brotherly  affection ;  when  a  man  shuts  his 
heart  against  compassion,  and  refuses  to  relieve 
the  misery  of  his  fellow-creatures  when  he  caa 


380  PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION. 

with  the  greatest  ease — in  all  these  cases,  though 
every  body  blames  the  conduct,  nobody  imagines 
that  those  who  might  have  reason  perhaps  to  ex¬ 
pect  more  kindness,  have  any  right  to  extort  it  by 
force.  The  sufferer  can  only  complain,  and  the 
spectator  can  intermeddle  in  no  other  way  than  by 
advice  and  persuasion.  Upon  all  such  occasions, 
for  equals  to  use  force  against  one  another,  would 
be  thought  the  highest  degree  of  insolence  and 
presumption.” — He  then  proceeds  to  observe  on 
the  propriety  of  a  government  interfering  by  law 
to  enforce  the  charities  of  kindness  and  gratitude 
— and  though  he  concedes  more  than  we  should 
feel  disposed  to  do  on  this  subject;  still  he  admits, 
that,  to  prescribe  rules  which  not  only  prohibit 
mutual  injuries  among  fellow-citizens,  but  com¬ 
mand  mutual  good  offices  to  a  certain  degree,  is, 
of  all  the  duties  of  a  lawgiver,  that  which  requires 
the  greatest  delicacy  and  reserve  to  execute  with 
propriety  and  judgment — and  to  push  it  too  far  is 
destructive  of  all  liberty  security  and  justice. 

12.  But  there  are  certain  peculiarities  connect¬ 
ed  with  the  virtue  of  gratitude,  which  have  escaped 
the  observation  of  our  most  distinguished  moralists. 
If  when  law  enacts  a  premium  to  humanity,  and 
tries  in  this  way  to  stimulate  the  benefactor  to  his 
appropriate  virtue,  the  virtue  loses  its  character, 
because  it  then  loses  the  nature  of  a  free  and  dis¬ 
interested  exercise — does  it  not  also  lose  its  char¬ 
acter,  if  the  benefactor,  instead  of  looking  for  a 
return  from  the  state,  looks  for  his  return  from  the 
individual  on  whom  he  lavishes  his  goodness  ?  It 
makeih  no  difference,  one  should  think,  from  what 


PEUFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION.  381 

quarter  he  counteth  upon  his  reward.  If  he 
count  on  a  reward  at  all,  does  not  this  taint  and 
transform  the  beneficence,  from  an  office  of  pure 
generosity,  to  one  of  ignoble  selfishness.  And  if 
this  be  perceived  by  him  who  is  the  object  of  his 
seeming  kindness,  will  it  not  chill  the  very  gratitude 
that  was  meant  to  be,  and  that  otherwise  might 
have  been  awakened  by  it  ?  Let  a  man  but  work 
for  thanks ;  and  the  discovery  of  this  being  his 
object,  is  just  the  most  effectual  way  to  disappoint 
him  of  its  attainment.  It  is  disinterested  good¬ 
will  which  is  the  proper  object  of  gratitude — and 
in  the  moment  that  the  former  changes  its  wonted 
aspect,  the  latter  ceases  from  its  wonted  reflection. 
The  one  is  the  voice,  the  other  is  the  echo  of  the 
voice.  If  the  note  of  emission  pass  from  one  of 
pure  kindness,  to  one  of  calculating  policy — the 
note  of  respondency  will  pass  from  one  of  pure 
gratitude,  to  that  of  a  counteractive  and  perhaps 
overmatching  policy  back  again.  It  is  quite  in¬ 
dispensable,  then,  that  the  beneficence  should  be 
originated,  not  by  the  hope  of  return,  but  by  a 
proper  impulse  of  its  own — by  a  genuine  principle 
of  well-doing — by  an  honest  desire  for  the  good  of 
its  object — such  a  desire  as  finds  its  rest  and  its 
complacent  gratification,  in  the  happiness  that  has 
been  rendered  to  him.  It  is  only  then  that  the 
love  of  the  benefactor  stands  unequivocally  out  to 
the  eye  of  the  recipient ;  and  ’tis  only  then  that 
the  love  of  a  thankful  heart,  can  go  fully  and  will¬ 
ingly  back  to  the  source  from  whence  its  emotion 
has  been  derived.  If,  instead  of  this,  beneficence 
should  go  forth  in  the  expectation  of  a  recompense. 


382  PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION. 

and  in  readiness  perhaps  to  enforce  the  expecta¬ 
tion  hy  a  claim — then,  besides  inflicting  suicide 
upon  itself,  does  it  extinguish  from  the  heart  of 
him  who  is  the  object  of  it,  the  very  principle  that 
would  dictate  such  a  recompense.  The  gratitude 
that  would  have  sprung  forth  to  meet  the  sensibili¬ 
ties  of  a  generous  benefactor,  becomes  cold  and 
motionless,  so  soon  as  it  descries  in  his  enterprise 
the  character  of  a  sordid  speculation.  And  there¬ 
fore  do  we  repeat  it  to  be  quite  indispensable  to 
this  process,  that  what  has  been  called  the  debt  of 
gratitude  shall  not  be  in  the  contemplation  of  him 
who  is  on  the  point  of  earning  it.  Unlike  to  other 
debts,  it  is  cancelled  on  the  instant  that  he  enters 
it  into  his  ledger.  It  will  not  be  compelled,  nor 
permit  any  seizure  to  be  made, upon  it — and,  though 
it  may  delight  of  its  own  proper  movement  to  send 
back  the  tide  of  a  most  plenteous  return  into  his 
bosom,  yet  will  it  vanish  before  his  gras]). 

13.  But  to  pursue  this  emotion  still  further 
through  its  various  delicacies.  Though  the  del>t 
of  gratitude  should  on  no  account  be  entered  into 
the  ledger  of  the  benefactor — it  should  be  felt  in 
the  full  weight  of  its  obligation,  and  entered  against 
himself  into  the  ledger  of  the  other  {)arty.  Though 
the  one  party  ought  not  to  claim  it — the  other  party 
ought  freely  to  own  and  fully  to  discharge  it. 
There  is  a  very  observable  peculiarity  in  this  debt 
of  gratitude.  It  should  not  be  exacted  by  him 
who  is  the  creditor — and  yet  by  him  who  is  the 
debtor  it  should  be  as  promptly  yielded  to,  as 
would  the  most  imperious  demand  of  justice,  d'he 
benefactor  who  Jays  his  account  with  it,  degraucs 


PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION.  383 


his  kindness,  and  disqualifies  himself  from  the  re¬ 
ward  of  kindness  back  again.  It  were  therefore 
wrong  for  him  to  do  in  the  garb  of  liberality,  what 
he  does  in  the  anticipation  of  a  return.  It  is  a 
very  peculiar  sort  of  obligation  which  the  one  party 
ought  not  to  count  upon,  and  yet  which  the  other 
party  ought  not  to  withhold — a  debt  that  is  made 
utterly  void,  if  it  can  be  proved,  that,  at  the  time 
of  its  being  contracted,  the  creditor  looked  forward 
to  the  payment  of  it — and  a  debt  that  is  valid  and 
binding,  in  proportion  to  the  intensity  of  that  love, 
which,  forgetting  itself  in  its  object,  would  prefer 
against  him  no  claim  and  oppress  him  with  no 
obligation. 

14.  Yet  mark  what  might  appear  to  be  an 
anomaly  in  this  affection.  He  who  never  once 
thought  of  gratitude  at  the  time  of  his  liberality, 
is  agonized  to  the  very  quick,  when  he  finds  after 
it,  that  no  gratitude  is  coming.  The  man  whom 
without  anticipation,  and  from  the  current  impulse 
of  the  kind  and  generous  affection  that  was  upon 
him,  he  cherished  and  relieved  and  comforted  to 
the  uttermost — that  man  may  inflict  upon  him  the 
most  painful  of  all  moral  sensations  and  that  simply 
by  his  want  of  gratitude.  It  is  altogether  worthy 
of  remark,  that,  though  while  lavishing  his  profus- 
est  bounty  on  the  man  whom  he  pitied  and  befriend¬ 
ed  ke  never  once  thought  of  a  return,  and  so  at 
the  time  was  neither  courting  nor  caring  for  it — 
yet,  let  there  be  no  returning  demonstration  of 
kindness  back  again,  and  his  whole  sentient  frame 
may  quiver  with  indignation  at  the  very  thought 
of  it.  He  will  recoil  from  the  object  of  his  mis- 


384  PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION. 


placed  and  sorely  misused  generosity,  as  he  would 
from  a  viper — and  it  is  indeed  a  wondrous  evolu¬ 
tion  of  our  nature ;  that  while  to  have  looked 
forward  to  the  repayment  of  gratitude  would  have 
marred  his  beneficence,  nay,  falsified*  all  its  titles 
and  its  claims — yet,  afterwards,  let  this  offering 
of  the  heart  be  withheld,  and  with  all  the  vehe¬ 
mence  of  a  man  who  has  been  outraged  of  his 
dues,  he  will  protest  and  storm  and  give  vent  to 
the  bitterest  execrations. 

15.  And  in  this  very  exhibition  of  feeling,  he 
will  be  seconded  and  sympathized  with  by  impar¬ 
tial  spectators — so  that  if  sympathy  be  the  test  of 
right  feeling  he  feels  rightly  in  this  anger  at  ingra¬ 
titude.  The  object  of  his  anger,  in  fact,  will  be 
the  object  of  their  indignation;  and  we  know  not 
a  single  vice,  against  which  all  the  asperities  of 
language  have  been  more  freely  or  forcibly  dis¬ 
charged,  or  against  which  eloquent  men  have 
poured  forth  more  dire  and  emphatic  denunciations. 
We  recollect  not  a  more  frequent  theme  of  declam¬ 
atory  invective  than  black  ingratitude,  or  one  that 
has  had,  more  readily  and  by  general  consent,  a 
place  assigned  to  it  among  the  foulest  atrocities  of 
human  guilt — against  which  there  is  conceived, 
not  only  the  hatred  of  a  keen  sentient  emotion, 
but  also  the  most  violent  perhaps  of  all  our  moral 
antipathies — it  being  both  that  whereby  the  indi¬ 
vidual  who  suffers  it  is  most  apt  to  be  personally 
stung,  and  also  that  wherein  he  is  most  sure  to  be 
publicly  sympathized  with. 

16.  Now  the  anger  of  him  who  suffers  ingrati¬ 
tude,  approven  as  it  is  by  eye-witnesses  and 


KFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION.  385 


seconded  by  their  indignation,  is  very  nearly  akin 
to  the  anger  of  him  who  suffers  injustice— jimt 
whose  anger  is  alike  approven  of,  and  alike  second¬ 
ed.  Did  I  give  a  sum  of  money  to  another  under 
promise  of  repayment,  I  would  resent  liis  broken 
faith,  and  I  could  excite  the  sympathy  of  all  my 
fellows  by  proclamation  of  the  wrong.  But  had 
the  money,  instead  of  being  given  upon  his  pro¬ 
mise,  been  given  at  the  instigation  of  my  own  pity 
and  because  of  the  tenderness  I  bore  him — if,  in¬ 
stead  of  loan,  it  had  been  rendered  without  condi¬ 
tion  and  without  constraint — a  pure  unfettered 
gratuity,  to  ward  off  a  menaced  prosecution,  or  to 
uphold  the  sinking  fortunes  of  his  family — then  if, 
in  the  course  of  years,  the  revolving  wheel  which 
brought  round  my  time  of  misfortune,  and  elevated 
him  to  the  heights  of  aiiluence  and  prosperity, 
should  afford  an  opportunity  from  which  he  sneak¬ 
ed  aloof,  or  of  which  he  had  the  hardihood  to 
spurn  it  away  from  him — should  he,  all  unmindful 
not  of  his  old  engagement  for  this  w^e  do  not  sup¬ 
pose  him  to  have  contracted,  but  of  my  old  friend¬ 
ship,  look  unmoved  on  the  arrest,  and  the  seques¬ 
tration,  and  the  imprisonment,  and  the  domestic 
agony  of  gloom  and  hopelessness  from  w  hich  at  a 
period  still  fresh  in  the  remembrance  of  us  both  I 
had  hastened  w  ith  generous  and  w^ell-timed  alacrity 
to  rescue  himself — we  sav  that  the  debt  of  arati- 
tude,  thus  dishonoured  and  disowuied,  will  kindle 
a  hotter  flame  of  indignancy  in  the  heart,  than 
either  infringed  truth  or  violated  justice,  'i’lie 
injury  thus  laid  upon  the  spirit,  will  be  felt  as  tiie 
ceepest  and  tlie  deadliest  of  all  iujui'ies.  It  will 

VOL.  V.  B 


386  PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION. 

lie  as  much  sorer  to  the  outraged  sensibilities  of 
him  who  suffers  by  it,  as  a  wound  inflicted  by  the 
hand  of  a  friend,  is  sorer  than  would  be  the  same 
wmund  inflicted  by  the  hand  of  an  enemy  ;  and 
therefore  it  were  interesting  to  know'  what  are  the 
similarities  and  what  are  the  distinctions  between 
these  two  obligations — between  the  debt  incurred 
by  the  stipulations  of  a  bargain,  and  the  debt  in¬ 
curred  by  the  kind  and  generous  but  withal  uncon¬ 
ditional  offerings  of  that  beneficence  which  has  been 
rendered  to  me. 

17.  There  is  an  ambiguity  in  the  term  “  right,” 
the  explanation  of  which  serves  well  to  mark  the 
distinction  between  the  virtues  of  justice  and 
humanity,  or,  as  they  have  been  denominated,  the 
virtues  of  perfect  and  imperfect  obligation.  This 
term  right  admits  at  least  of  two  significations, 
which  differ,  the  one  from  the  other.  In  the  first 
of  them  it  is  used  substantively  ;  and  may  be  exem¬ 
plified  by  such  affirmations  as  that  I  have  a  right 
to  my  own,  and  I  have  a  right  to  the  payment  of 
such  a  debt  that  is  owing  to  me,  and  I  have  a 
right  to  a  certain  inheritance  that  has  been  be¬ 
queathed.  In  the  second  it  is  used  adjectively ; 
and  may  be  exemplified  by  such  affirmations  as 
that  it  is  right  to  yield  a  grateful  return  for  the 
kindness  which  has  been  shown  to  me — or  it  is 
right  to  compassionate  and  relieve  distress — or 
even  it  is  right  to  forgive  and  to  pass  by  trans¬ 
mission.  It  is  the  more  necessary  to  mark  the 

O  v 

distinction  between  these  two  senses,  for  it  may 
occasionally  happen,  that,  in  one  sense  it  may  be 


PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGAIION.  387 

asserted  and  in  another  it  may  he  denied  of  the 
very  same  thing.  I  may  have  a  right  to  a  given 
property ;  and  yet,  now  in  the  use  and  possession 
of  a  poor  relative  who  would  suffer  by  the  depri¬ 
vation,  it  may  not  be  right  in  me  to  insist  on  it.  - 
I  may  have  a  right  to  the  instant  payment  of  what 
I  granted  in  loan ;  and  yet  it  may  not  be  right  for 
me  to  exact  it  from  the  industrious  father  of  a 
sinking  and  a  struggling  family.  1  may  have  a 
right  to  the  tenement  of  which  the  now  deceased 
owner  had  made  me  the  heir ;  and  yet  it  may  not 
be  right  to  dispossess  its  straitened  and  humble 
occupier,  who  perhaps  thought  that  there  he  would 
have  spent  in  peace  the  evening  of  his  days.  We 
can  from  these  instances  perceive  the  dilference 
between  a  legal  right  and  a  moral  rectitude ;  and 
how  a  claim  may  rightfully  belong  to  me,  and 
which  I  can  therefore  prosecute  at  law,  and  yet  it 
might  be  extremely  right  in  me  to  postpone  if  not 
altogether  to  relinquish  it.  I  may  have  a  right  to 
prosecute,  and  yet  it  not  be  right  in  me  to  enter 
on  a  prosecution.  That  right  might  be  altogether 
good  in  the  eye  of  the  law,  which,  in  the  eye  of 
sound  morality,  it  might  be  altogether  wrong  in 
me  to  insist  on. 

18.  Nor  do  we  say  that  this  is  due  to  any  fault 
or  blemish  in  the  constitution  of  human  law. 
There  can  many  an  occasion  be  conceived,  when 
it  would  be  wrong  for  me  rigorously  to  enforce  a 
right  which  I  have  upon  my  neighbour ;  and  yet 
it  follows  not  on  that  account,  that  law  should 
interpose  to  cancel  the  riglit,  or  to  release  the 
other  party  from  his  correspondent  obligation. 


88  PKTIFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION. 

Did  it  thus  undertake  for  every  case  of  hardship, 
and  fall  from  its  demands  in  every  one  instance 
when  it  would  be  right  for  me  the  vested  and 
authorized  holder  to  forbear  the  prosecution  of 
them — this  would  bring  a  fearful  insecurity  on 
property ;  and,  if  not  utterly  efface,  at  least  obscure 
that  line  of  demarcation  by  which  it  is  at  once 
defined  and  guarded.  And  besides,  it  would  leave 
no  scope  for  the  generosities  of  our  nature,  if 
man  were  not  left  at  liberty,  either  to  insist  upon 
his  claims  or  to  forbear  them  at  his  pleasure.  It 
would  supersede  the  need  of  compassion,  if,  upon 
every  occasion  when  it  were  right  for  it  to  come 
forth  with  its  willing  dispensations,  law  also  came 
forth  with  the  authoritative  declaration  that  they 
were  altogether  due — thereby  wresting  from  bene¬ 
ficence  its  own  proper  exercises,  and  turning 
that  which  ought  to  be  a  matter  of  free  indul¬ 
gence,  into  a  matter  of  strict  and  legal  necessity. 
And,  more  injurious  still  to  the  welfare  of  our 
species,  this  constant  interference  by  law  on  the 
side  of  the  distressed  and  unfortunate — this  per¬ 
petual  rescinding  of  the  obligations  under  which 
they  lay,  at  the  moment  when  it  was  right  for  the 
other  party  in  point  of  humanity  to  relax  them — 
would  not  only  absolve  him  who  might  else  have 
been  gently  or  generously  dealt  with  from  all  gra¬ 
titude  ;  but  it  might  practically  absolve  him,  and 
many  others  in  his  circumstances,  from  that  stre¬ 
nuous  industry,  that  sober  and  regulated  expendi¬ 
ture,  that  high  and  honourable  sense  of  truth, 
under  which,  had  it  not  been  for  the  vacillations  cf 
an  unsteady  and  compromising  law,  they  cou.d 


PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION.  389 

have  met  all  these  obligations,  and  most  faithfully 
have  discharged  them.  So  that  it  is  altogether 
for  the  healthful  state  of  the  community,  that  the 
law  of  right  and  property  should  be  inflexible — 
though  the  men,  whom  it  thus  guards  and  thus 
guarantees,  should,  bearing  their  privileges  meekly, 
be  kind  and  humane  and  tender  hearted  in  the 
prosecution  of  them.  This  it  is  morally  right  for 
them  to  be,  though,  legally,  they  have  a  firm  and 
infrangible  right  to  be  otherwise — and,  though  the 
legal  right  is  often  made  to  carry  it  over  the  moral 
rectitude — though  the  one  is  at  times  prosecuted 
in  a  stern  and  selfish  and  vindictive  spirit,  while 
the  mild  and  moderate  suggestions  of  the  other  are 
wholly  disregarded — though  an  unrelenting  creditor 
has  been  seen  to  lift  on  high  the  bond,  and  to 
spread  out  the  claims  and  contents  of  the  bond 
over  the  last  wrecks  of  a  ruined  though  deserving 
family — still  it  is  greatly  better  that,  while  human 
,  earts  should  feel,  human  law  should  be  unfalter¬ 
ing  ;  that  the  fence  of  property  should  be  stable, 
and  declared,  and  ought  on  no  account  to  be  tam¬ 
pered  with ;  that  it  should  mark  off  and  apart  from 
each  other,  the  region  of  humanity  and  the  region 
of  justice;  and  while  the  justice  is  at  all  times 
open  to  the  merciful  visitations  of  humanity,  hu¬ 
manity,  free  of  all  jurisprudence,  and  kept  aloof 
from  the  dictations  of  authority,  ought,  if  we  want 
to  uphold  her  energies  or  to  sustain  her  proper 
chai*acter  inviolate,  never  to  be  legalized. 

19.  It  is  therefore  no  reflection,  but  the  opposite, 
on  the  existing  jurisprudence  of  society — that  there 
are  many  things  morally  right,  which  it  hath  not 


390  PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION. 


made  to  be  legally  binding ;  and  many  things  most 
offensively  and  execrably  wrong,  which  it  visits 
with  no  chastisement  whatever.  It  hath  left  bene¬ 
ficence  free,  and  it  ought  to  do  so — yet  we  can 
imagine  such  derelictions  from  this  virtue,  as  would 
make  a  man  to  be  a  monster  in  the  eye  of  all  his 
fellows.  He  might  pass  the  waylaid  and  wounded 
traveller,  as  priest  and  Levite  did  of  old,  and  leave 
him  to  die — he  might  look  unfeelingly,  nay  exult- 
ingly,  on  while  another  is  drowning  with  the  stream 
without  an  effort  to  extricate  him  from  his  perils — 
he  may  be  the  only  householder  of  his  vicinity, 
who,  while,  the  wealthiest  of  them  all,  has  shut 
his  impregnable  heart,  and  refused  to  share  in  that 
joint  benevolence  wherewith  his  poorer  neighbours 
have  raised  succour  and  supply  for  a  starving 
family.  We  are  not  aware  that,  by  one  or  other 
of  these  offences,  he  has  trespassed  on  any  legal 
right,  or  can  be  proceeded  against  before  any  legal 
tribunal.  Or,  in  other  words,  he  is  not  legally 
he  is  only  morally  wrong — and  better  far,  we  re¬ 
peat,  than  that  free  humanity  should  be  spoiled  of 
her  native  graces,  or  that  the  sympathies  of  the 
heart  should  be  moulded  or  meddled  with  by  the 
cold  hand  of  public  and  political  regulation — 
better,  that  such  rare  and  unnatural  hardihood 
should  be  left  to  its  own  punishment,  in  the  revolt 
of  all  the  sensibilities  that  are  around  it,  in  the 
scorn  and  execration  of  society. 

/  20.  And  it  will  perhaps  impress  the  distinction 

which  we  try  to  illustrate  still  more  forcibly,  to 
pass  on  from  a  case  of  refused  or  neglected  bene¬ 
ficence,  to  a  case  of  abandoned  friendship  or 


PEHFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION  3^1 

violated  gratitude.  Neither  here  does  law  inter¬ 
pose  with  its  restraints  and  obligations ;  nor  ought 
it  to  do  so.  The  debt  of  gratitude  is  no  more 
pleadable  before  it,  than  the  debt  of  honour.  It 
taketh  no  cognizance  of  any  other,  than  the  debt 
of  justice.  This  it  will  strictly  award  to  the  strict 
and  stern  prosecutor  thereof ;  and  nothing  but  the 
hand  of  benevolence  can  stay  its  execution.  And 
often  the  hand  of  benevolence  does  interpose,  to 
save  a  father  from  imprisonment — to  save  a  weep¬ 
ing  family  from  the  agonies  of  a  sore  disgrace.  A 
friend  steps  forward  who  cannot  sufrer  it ;  and  he 
makes  the  generous  sacrifice ;  and  he  restores  to 
independence  and  the  free  use  of  his  industry,  the 
man  who  but  for  him  might  have  sunk  into  a  poverty 
that  was  abject  and  irrecoverable,  but  who  now 
might  regain  a  prouder  height  of  prosperity  than 
that  from  which  he  had  fallen.  And  such  are  this 
world’s  fluctuations,  that,  in  a  few  years  or  months, 
the  benefactor  might  become  the  bankrupt,  and 
the  former  bankrupt  be  now  looked  for  as  the  alert 
and  willing  benefactor.  It  might  well  be  expected, 
that  he  who  discharged  for  him  the  debt  of  justice, 
should  now  be  owned  by  him  in  the  debt  of  grati¬ 
tude — but  still  the  law  that  enforced  the  one, 
utterly  declines  to  enforce  the  other,  or  to  superadd 
its  own  obligations  to  those  of  Nature  and  con¬ 
science.  That  which  to  the  highest  degree  is 
morally  wrong,  it  refuses  to  deal  with  as  legally 
wrong.  And  so,  if,  from  the  summit  of  his  present 
affluence,  he  should  look  down  with  neglectful 
scorn  on  the  benefactor  who  was  now  sinking  into 
tne  abyss  below — if,  all  regardless  of  the  days 


392  PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION, 

when  from  that  very  abyss  he  was  removed  him¬ 
self  by  the  heart  that  now  is  failing  under  the 
view  of  its  terrors,  and  the  hand  that  now  hangs  in 
hopeless  despondency;  if,  wrapt  in  hateful  selfish¬ 
ness,  he  can  look  unmoved  on  the  gloomy  fears 
and  sufferings  of  a  family,  whose  father’s  eye 
melted  in  pity  over  the  approaching  beggary  of  his 
own  children ;  if,  amid  the  song  and  the  dance 
and  the  sumptuous  festivity  of  his  splendid  apart¬ 
ments,  there  is  not  room  for  one  moment  of  tender¬ 
ness,  in  behalf  of  the  friend  who  pitied  and  who 
served  him — there  is  no  enactment  of  human  law 
that  can  recall  the  turpitude  of  such  an  exhibition 
— no  other  principles  of  this  world  to  constrain  his 
gratitude,  but  the  shame  of  his  own  worthlessness, 
the  abomination  of  his  fellow- men. 

21.  We  hold  that  the  chief  diversity  of  senti¬ 
ment,  or  at  least  of  statement,  among  the  expounders 
of  moral  science,  has  proceeded  from  that  amb* 
guity  of  meaning,  to  which  we  have  just  adverteo, 
in  regard  to  the  term  right.  When  taken  substan¬ 
tively  it  signifies  that  which  might  be  the  subject 
of  a  claim  upon  the  one  side  and  of  an  obligation 
upon  the  other — as  my  right  to  the  fulfilment  of  a 
promise  that  has  been  made  to  me,  or  the  right  of 
a  creditor  to  payment,  or  the  right  of  a  master  to 
obedience.  The  same  term,  when  taken  adjectively, 
signifies  the  moral  worth  of  that  to  which  it  is  ap¬ 
plied.  It  is  then  tantamount  to  rectitude  or  to 
rightness,  and  is  not  only  distinct  from  the  former 
sense  but  may  even  come  into  opposition  with  it. 
Cases  might  occur,  when,  though  i  have  a  right  to 
the  fulfilment  of  a  certain  promise,  yei‘  it  may  not 


PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION.  393 

be  right  for  me  to  insist  upon  it— and  when,  though 
I  have  also  a  right  to  the  payment  of  a  debt,  yet 
it  may  not  be  right  for  me  to  exact  the  payment — 
and  when,  though  I  have  a  right  to  the  obedience 
of  my  servant,  yet  when  afflicted  by  the  tidings  of 
some  family  death,  it  would  not  be  right,  it  were 
barbarous  and  therefore  utterly  wrong,  to  require 
it.  These  are  enough  to  demonstrate  that  the 
right  and  the  rightness,  that  which  constitutes  the 
claim  and  that  which  constitutes  the  moral  quality, 
are  separable  both  in  idea  and  in  fact  from  each 
other. 

22.  But  though  the  right  and  the  rightness  are  thus 
separable  in  regard  to  the  holder  of  the  right,  they 
are  not  so  in  regard  to  the  other  party .  1  hough 

it  be  sometimes  right  for  me  the  creditor  to  for¬ 
bear  the  prosecution  of  a  debt — yet  it  is  at  all  times 
right  for  him  the  debtor,  to  strain  his  labour  and 
his  frugality  to  the  uttermost,  in  order  to  make  out 
the  payment.  Though  it  be  sometimes  right  for 
me  the  master,  to  dispense  with  the  due  obedience 

_ yet  it  is  at  all  times  right  for  him  the  servant,  to 

struggle  against  any  adverse  influence  that  might 
prevent  the  tull  and  the  faithful  execution  of  his 
task.  I  may  have  a  right  over  another  man,  which 
it  might  be  very  wrong  for  me  to  act  upon.  But 
if  another  man  have  a  right  over  me,  it  is  never 
wrong,  it  is  at  all  times  right,  for  me  to  act  upon  it. 
The  proprietor  of  a  legal  claim,  may  incur  a  most 
grievous  moral  turpitude,  by  proceeding  theieupon. 
But  with  the  subject  of  such  a  claim,  what  is 
legally  is  also  morally  incumbent.  1  he  right  and 
the  rightness  are  inseparably  blended — nor  are  w® 

E  9 


394  PERFECT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION. 

to  marvel  if  an  association  so  close,  so  constant, 
j:nd  recurring  so  frequently  in  the  negotiations  of 
human  intercourse,  should  have  wrought  very  deep 
and  discernible  traces  of  itself,  both  in  the  specu¬ 
lations  of  philosophy,  and  in  the  language  of  our 
general  population. 

23.  The  very  application  of  the  term  in  ques¬ 
tion  is  a  fruit  of  this  association.  It  is  not  at  all 
times  right  in  a  man,  to  proceed  to  the  very  utter¬ 
most  of  law  upon  his  own  right ;  but  at  all  times 
right  in  him  to  defer  the  very  uttermost  to  the 
rights  of  others.  And  even  as  to  him  who  is  the 
holder,  the  very  possession  of  a  right  gives  in  most 
instances  a  rightness  to  that,  which,  apart  from 
this  possession,  would  be  altogether  wrong.  In 
virtue  of  this  right,  it  may  be  right  for  him  to  lay 
an  ai’rest  upon  the  rents  of  some  extravagant 
debtor  who  hath  no  feeling  for  his  difficulties ;  or 
right  to  compel  the  services  of  some  lazy  domestic ; 
or  right  to  exact  from  some  faithless  or  forgetful 
neighbour,  the  last  tittle  of  some  engagement  on 
which  we  had  been  counting — all  which  things, 
apart  from  our  proprietory  right  to  them,  would 
have  been  just  as  wrong  as  spoliation  or  tyranny. 
The  legal  right  and  the  moral  rightness  are  of  un¬ 
excepted  conjunction  in  regard  to  one  of  the  parties, 
even  him  who  is  the  subject  of  the  obligation  ; 
and,  in  regard  to  the  holder  of  it,  they  are,  in  far 
the  greater  number  of  instances,  consistent  the  one 
with  the  other ;  and  it  is  his  right,  in  all  these 
instances,  that  gives  a  rightness  to  what  would 
otherwise  have  been  wrong.  No  wonder  then, 
since  the  right  and  the  rightness  are  so  generally 


PERFFXT  AND  IMPERFECT  OBLIGATION.  395 

blenched  in  fact,  that  many  have  lost  sight  of  the  real 
distinction  wliich  there  is  between  them.  The  veiy 
application  of  the  same  term  to  each,  must  help  still 
more  to  assimilate,  or  rather  to  identify,  the  one 
with  the  other,  in  the  imagination  of  men.  And 
we  doubt  not,  that,  as  on  the  one  hand  it  was  the 
close  alliance  between  these  two  distinct  things 
which  suggested  atthefirst  a  common  appellative  for 
both — so  the  continued  use  of  this  appellative  must 
serve  to  confound  them  still  more,  however  separ¬ 
able  they  are  in  conception,  and  however  separate 
they  are  in  substance  from  each  other. 

24.  We  feel  strongly  persuaded,  that,  if  the  right 
and  the  rightness  had  been  kept  as  distinct  in  the 
view  of  the  inquirer  as  they  might  and  they  should 
have  been,  it  would  have  cleared  away  a  shade 
at  least  of  that  obscurity,  which  hangs  over  certain 
of  these  questions,  that  are  generally  regarded  as 
fundamental  questions  in  Moral  Science.  Now 
the  same  indiscriminateness  that  obtains  in  the  use 
of  these  two  terms,  has  been  extended  to  two  other 
terms  which  mark  the  proper  counterparts  of  a 
right  and  a  rightness.  The  counterpart  of  a  right 
upon  one  side,  is  an  obligation  upon  the  other.  If 
anv  man  have  a  right  to  my  services,  I  am  under 
an  obligation  to  render  them.*  The  counterpart 

*  We  may  here  repeat  that  “  without  contending  for  the  Ian- 
gunge  of  our  older  moralists,  the  distinction  which  they  mean  to 
express  by  virtues  of  perfect  and  imperfect  obligation,  has  a 
foundation  in  reality  and  in  the  nature  of  things — as  between 
justice  wliere  the  obligation  on  one  side  implies  a  counterpart 
right  upon  the  other,  and  benevolence  to  which,  whatever  the 
obliitatiou  may  be  on  the  part  of  the  dispenser,  there  is  no  corre- 
fponding  right  on  the  part  of  the  recipient.  The  proper  office  of 


396  GENKKAl*  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE. 

again  of  a  rightness  is  not,  obligation,  but  appro¬ 
bation.  If  any  man  show  a  right  over  me,  it  is 
my  obligation  and  my  part  to  submit  thereunto. 
If  any  man  show  a  rightness  before  me,  it  is  my 
part  to  approve  of  it.  These  counterpart  terms 
have  been  as  much  confounded,  in  fact,  as  the 
right  and  the  rightness  have  been.  One  of  them 
is  made  use  of  in  the  question,  “  What  is  the 
object  of  moral  approbation  ?” — and  another  in  the 
question,  “  What  is  the  source  or  origin  or  some¬ 
times  the  principle  of  moral  obligation  ?”  We 
believe  that  by  aid  of  the  distinction  to  which  we 
have  just  adverted,  a  more  precise  deliverance 
could  be  made  upon  each  of  these  questions. 


CHAPTER  X. 

On  Diversities  of  Statement,  in  regard  to  the 
General  Questions  of  Moral  Science,  or  Sgstems 
of  Moral  Philosophy. 

1.  We  do  not  regard  Etymology  as  a  good  arbi¬ 
trator  upon  Moral  questions.  But  we  hold  it  to 
be  a  good  witness  or  informer,  as  to  the  views  that 
men  are  apt  to  take  upon  these  questions.  It  does 
not  represent  the  truth  of  the  science ;  but  it 
represents  the  testimonies  of  popular  sentiment  in 
regard  to  it.  The  most  laborious  analysis  of 

law  is  to  enforce  the  former  virtues.  When  it  attempts  to  en¬ 
force  the  latter,  it  makes  a  mischievous  extension  of  itself  beyond 
its  own  legitimate  boundaries.” 


OEJfEllAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE.  39/ 

words,  will  not  guide  us  backward  to  the  real  prin¬ 
ciples  or  elements  of  ethical  doctrines  ;  and,  for  this 
purpose,  the  doctrine  must  be  assailed  as  it  were 
by  a  direct  analysis  of  its  own.  Still  the  analysis 
of  words  will  throw  light  on  the  prevalent  impres¬ 
sions  that  men  have  had  of  ethical  doctrine  ;  and 
under  which  impressions  they  actually  bodied  forth, 
if  not  the  sound  philosophy  of  the  subject,  at  least 
their  own  feelings  and  their  own  conceptions  in 
regard  to  it.  This  does  not  supersede  the  appli¬ 
cation  of  the  only  legitimate  test  taken  from  the 
inherent  principles  of  the  subject  itself ;  and  by 
which  alone,  every  position  in  moral  science  ought 
to  be  estimated.  But  yet  it  is  interesting  to  know 
what  have  been  the  actual  thoughts,  and  what  are 
the  actual  delusions  of  men  in  any  given  matter  of 
human  speculation  ;  and,  as  being  a  record  of  these, 
we  deem  that  there  is  something  more  than  enter¬ 
tainment  or  a  charm — that  there  is,  in  truth,  a  sub¬ 
stantial  instruction  to  be  gathered  in  the  pursuits 
of  etymology. 

2.  The  word  Duty,  'then,  supplies  another 
example  of  the  right  and  the  rightness  being 
blended  together  in  popular  imagination.  In  its 
extended  sense  it  embraces  all  rectitude  ;  and  all 
rectitude  it  is  our  duty  to  observe,  though  there 
existed  no  Being  in  the  universe  who  had  a  right 
to  enjoin  the  observation  of  it  from  our  hands.  It 
is  equivalent  to  moral  pro])riety,  right  at  all  times 
and  in  all  circumstances  for  us  to  maintain,  even 
though  none  should  have  a  right  to  exact  it  from  us. 
And  yet  the  term  Duty  hath  emanated  from  the 
term  due  which  is  tantamount  to  a  right,  that  can  be 


398  GENERAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE 

claiiRed  by  one  party,  and  which  another  party  is 
under  the  obligation  of  rendering.  This  proves 
the  extent  to  which  the  right  and  the  rightness  are 
conjoined  in  fact ;  and  yet  they  are  at  all  times 
separable  in  idea,  and  in  fact  are  often  separate. 
It  may  be  our  duty  to  give  to  a  needy  person, 
though  the  thing  given  is  in  no  way  his  due.  It 
may  be  my  duty  to  forgive  a  guilty  person,  though 
to  say  that  forgiveness  was  his  due  were  a  contra¬ 
diction  in  terms.  The  Latin  Debitum,  a  debt 
clearly  involves  a  legal  right  upon  the  one  side, 
and  a  legal  obligation  upon  the  other.  Yet  the 
“  deheo”  and  the  “  debet,'’  include  all  rightness, 
all  that  a  man  ought  to  do.  And  indeed,  the  very 
term  “  ought,”  clearly  belongs  to  the  same  family 
with  the  term  “  owe,”  and  further  too  wdth  the 
term  “own” — all  that  being  my  own  which  I  can 
claim  as  mine,  and  which,  though  now  in  the  hand 
of  another  still  is  owed  or  owen  to  me.  This  all 
goes  to  prove,  how  closely  associated  in  the  minds 
of  men  the  right  and  the  rightness  are  with  each 
other ;  and  yet  the  real  distinction  between  them 
might  be  evinced,  in  the  using  of  these  very  terms. 
It  may  be  that  I  ought  to  give  to  another  a  sum 
of  money,  which  I  do  not  owe  him.  We  do  not 
owe  a  man  forgiveness,  when  at  the  same  time  w'e 
ought  to  forgive  him.  I  ought  or  I  aught  what¬ 
ever  is  my  own — and  yet  it  may  be  that  part  of 
what  I  thus  ought  as  now  belonging  to  myself, 
ought  at  this  time,  by  an  act  of  benevolence  on  my 
part,  to  have  been  the  property  of  another.  These 
remarks  point  to  a  distinction  between  duty  re¬ 
garded  in  the  light  of  moral  propriety  or  moi’ul 


GENERAL  (QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE.  399 


rectitude,  and  duty  regarded  in  the  light  of  moral 
obligation.* 

*  Horne  Tooke  hath  distinguished  himself  most,  in  this  work 
of  blending  moral  principle  and  speculation  with  etymology.  In 
his  chapter  on  the  Rights  of  Man,  he  derives  right  from  “  rectum," 
the  past  participle  of  rego  ;  and  just  from  “justum”  the  past 
participle  of  juheo.  And  so  much  is  etymology  his  idol  that  he 
iiolds  this  sufficient  authority  for  making  right  in  all  cases  tanta¬ 
mount  to  “  ordered.”  And  so  from  a  quarter,  whence  of  all 
others  perhaps  we  should  have  least  expected  it,  are  we  presented 
with  an  argument  in  behalf  of  that  ultra  orthodoxy,  which  would 
derive  the  virtuousness  of  all  that  is  morally  right,  solely  and 
exclusively  from  the  consideration,  that  it  is  enjoined  by  the  will 
of  God. 

The  following  extract  is  a  specimen  of  his  ingenuity.  “  The 
right  hand  is  that  which  custom,  and  those  who  have  brought  us 
up,  have  ordered  or  directed  us  to  use  in  preference,  when  one 
hand  only  is  employed  ;  and  the  left  hand  is  that  which  is  leaved, 
leav’d,  left — or  which  we  are  taught  to  leave  out  on  such  an 
occasion.  So  that  ‘  left,’  you  see,  is  also  a  past  participle. 
But  if  the  laws,  or  education,  or  custom  of  any  country  (it  may 
be  objected)  should  order  or  direct  its  inhabitants  to  use  the  left 
hand  in  preference,  how  would  your  explanation  of  right  hand 
apply  to  them  ?  And  I  remember  (says  the  objector),  1  remem¬ 
ber  to  have  read  in  the  Voyage  of  De  Gama  to  Kalekut  (the 
first  made  bv  the  Portuguese  round  Africa),  that  the  people  of 
Melinda,  a  polished  and  flourishing  people,  were  all  left-handed.” 
To  this  objection  the  author  replies,  that  “  with  reference  to  the 
European  custom,  it  is  described  truly.  But  the  people  of  Me¬ 
linda  are  as  right-handed  as  the  Portuguese — for  they  use  that 
hand  in  preference  which  is  ordered  by  their  custom,  and  leave 
out  of  employ  their  other,  which  is  therefore  their  left  hand.” 

At  this  rate  it  will  be  observed,  that,  had  the  Supreme  Being 
chosen  to  lay  two  different  countries  of  the  world  under  regimens 
that  were  wholly  opposite — instituting,  we  shall  say,  our  present 
decalogue  as  a  code  of  law  for  the  one ;  and  another  decalogue, 
reversed  in  all  its  articles,  as  a  code  of  law  for  the  other — it 
would  be  right  in  the  first,  to  observe  religion,  and  filial  piety, 
and  abstinence  from  all  personal  wrong,  and  purity,  and  truth. 
But  in  the  second,  it  would  have  been  equally  right  to  vilify 
one’s  God,  and  to  abandon  one’s  parents,  and  to  murder  one’s 
acquaintances,  and  to  have  entered  on  a  course  of  theft  and 
falsehood  and  licentiousness.  Nevertheless,  God’s  right  to  com¬ 
mand,  and  tlie  rightness  of  His  commandments  are  distinct  from 
each  other — though,  from  a  contingency  dependent  on  the  char¬ 
acter  of  God,  they  do  in  feet  at  all  times  harmonize. 


400  GENERAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCK 

3.  We  are  fully  aware  that,  in  these  observa¬ 
tions,  we  dissent  from  the  high  authority  of  Dr. 
Thomas  Brown,  who  is  peculiarly  lax  and  errone¬ 
ous,  in  his  views  upon  the  subject  of  duties  and 
rights,  as  being  accurately  and  at  all  points  the 
counterparts  to  each  other.  It  may  be  my  duty 
to  forgive  a  debt,  but  it  surely  does  not  follow 
from  this  that  my  debtor  hath  a  right  to  this  for¬ 
giveness;  and,  as  to  the  distinction  between  a  legal 
and  a  moral  right,  the  truth  is,  that  it  might  both 
be  morally  right  in  me  to  relinquish  my  claim, 
and  far  more  morally  right  in  him  to  decline  than 
it  would  be  for  him  to  accept  of  my  indulgence — 
far  more  right  to  struggle  with  his  difficulties  and 
at  length  work  out  the  payment,  than  it  would  be 
to  grasp  at  my  offered  indemnity,  and  rejoice  in 
tlie  deliverance  that  I  had  awarded  to  him.  The 
distinction  between  a  legal  right  and  a  moral  riglit- 
ness,  is  not  one  that  hath  been  wrought  out  arti¬ 
ficially  and  arbitrarily  from  the  practice  of  Law ; 
but  it  is  one  founded  on  the  natural  and  original 
principles  of  Law — not  the  resulting  manufacture 
of  such  codes  as  happen  to  have  been  established 
in  various  countries ;  but  preceding  the  formation 
of  any  special  code,  and  resulting  as  immediately 
from  the  moral  constitution  of  man  as  any  of  his 
private  or  personal  duties  do.  There  is  a  right 
and  rational  jurisprudence  for  society  that  as  much 
precedes  any  legal  institution — as  doth  a  right  and 
rational  system  of  morality  for  individuals  ;  and 
when  we  affirm  first  that  it  may  be  right  for  the 
one  party  to  forgive  a  debt  or  an  injury,  and 
again  that  the  other  party  may  still  have  no  right 


GENERAI  OUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE.  401 

to  such  a  forgiveness,  instead  of  the  affirmation 
being  a  mere  jingle  upon  the  technicalities  of  law, 
w(!  iiokl  it  to  be  a  substantial  and  important  prin- 
cijtle,  recommending  itself  at  once  to  our  sense  of 
rig! it  and  wrong,  and  approven  of  as  immediately 
by  our  natural  feelings  of  justice,  as  any  of  the 
plain  and  indisputable  aphorisms  in  morals  that 
are  recognised  by  all  men. 

4.  If  we  go  not  beyond  the  confines  of  human 
society — if  we  look  to  morality,  only  in  as  far  as  it 
reciprocates  and  has  its  interchange  among  the 
individuals  of  our  species — if  we  restrict  the  con¬ 
templation  to  earth,  and  to  those  vyho  live  upon  it 
and  have  a  moral  nature,  keeping  out  of  view  their 
relationship  with  other  or  with  higher  orders  of 
existence — then  we  have  many  a  rightness  without 
a  corresponding  right — many  duties  which  on  my 
part  should  be  performed,  but  not  one  of  which  is 
due  to  any  living  creature — many  things  which  I 
ought  to  do  and  yet  which  I  owe  to  no  man — 
many  actions  that  be  the  objects  of  praise,  and  yet 
are  not  at  all  the  matters  of  obligation.  They  are 
virtuous,  and  yet  I  am  not  bound  to  do  them. 
Every  man  will  comm^d  them,  yet  no  man  may 
claim  them  at  my  hand — and  thus  it  is,  that,  apart 
from  all  relationship  with  that  whicli  is  foreign  to 
our  world,  there  are  a  thousand  proprieties  that 
have  no  other  sanctions  than  the  approving  testi¬ 
mony  of  my  own  heart,  and  the  approving  voice 
of  my  fellows. 

5.  In  this  state  of  things  something  is  wanted, 
that  might  superinduce  obligation  upon  approba¬ 
tion;  that,  wherever  there  is  a  rightness,  there  should 


402  GENERAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIFNCF. 

somehow  or  other  he  the  right  of  enforcing  it — 
that  proprieties  should  be  turned  into  precepts, 
and  that  what  before  Avas  but  simply  approA-en  of 
as  morally  good,  should  become  strictly  and  judi¬ 
cially  incumbent.  Only  imagine  a  God  of  absolute 
property  in  us,  and  absolute  power  over  us — and 
thus  might  we  obtain  the  whole  of  that  adjustment 
which  we  are  in  quest  of.  Let  such  be  his  charac¬ 
ter,  that  his  will  is  on  the  side  of  virtue  in  all  the 
extent  of  it — let  him  but  assume  the  various  mora¬ 
lities  of  life  as  the  matters  of  his  commandment — 
let  every  one  rightness  of  which  man  is  capable  be 
translated,  in  the  shape  of  a  distinct  requisition, 
into  his  law ;  and  then,  but  in  no  other  way  that 
we  can  think  of,  will  all  that  is  the  object  of  moral 
approbation  become  in  the  proper  and  precise 
sense  of  the  term  a  thing  of  moral  obligation 
also.  One  can  conceive  it  otherwise.  The 
Supreme  Power  of  the  universe  might,  for  aught 
we  know,  have  been  the  enemy  of  moral  goodness ; 
and  instituted  another  regimen  than  that  of  virtue. 
He  might  have  promulgated  rewards  for  cruelty, 
and  deceit,  and  violence ;  and  denounced  penalties 
on  temperance,  and  humanity,  and  justice.  He 
might  have  given  us  the  very  nature  that  we  now 
possess ;  and  painfully  thwarted  all  our  estimations 
of  the  hatefulness  of  vice  and  the  excellence  and 
w^orth  of  virtue,  by  the  issuing  of  enactments  in 
favour  of  the  one,  and  imposing  prohibitions  and 
threats  upon  the  other.  He  might  have  emitted 
a  law  of  revelation,  that  was  in  painful  and  puzzling 
discordancy  with  the  law  of  the  heart;  and  so 
broken  up  the  alliance  that  now  is,  between  the 


GENERAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE.  403 

moral  rightness  of  actions,  and  the  legal  obligation 
there  is  upon  us  to  perform  them.  All  this  may 
be  imagined ;  and  it  is  useful  often  to  figure  what 
is  opposite  to  truth,  that  we  might  better  under¬ 
stand  both  the  import  and  the  effect  of  the  truth 
itself.  There  is  then  an  actual  harmony  between 
the  law  of  God  from  above,  and  the  law  within 
our  hearts  below.  What  the  one  recommends  as 
so  many  proprieties,  the  other  enjoins  as  so  many 
precepts.  That,  generally  speaking,  in  which  we 
by  our  faculty  of  moral  perception,  discern  a  moral 
rightness.  He,  in  the  exercise  of  his  right  of  sove¬ 
reignty,  hath  converted  into  a  positive  obligation. 
In  virtue  of  our  particular  relationship  to  God,  all 
whose  commandments  happen  to  be  right,  there  is 
nought  in  the  shape  of  duty,  which  is  not  also  due 
to  the  Being  who  made  us — there  is  nothing  that 
we  ought  to  do,  which  we  do  not  also  owe  to  the 
Master  who  claims  it  in  the  shape  of  obedience  to 
Himself — there  is  nought  which  is  simply  becom¬ 
ing  because  of  its  moral  goodness,  which  is  not 
also  legally  binding  because  of  a  law  from  heaven 
that  authoritatively  requires  it.  It  is  thus  and 
thus-alone,  as  far  as  w^e  perceive,  that  moral  appro¬ 
bation  and  moral  obligation  have  come  to  be  coex¬ 
tensive,  the  one  w  ith  the  other ;  and  that  each  is 
aiike  applicable  to  virtue  throughout  the  whole 
length  and  breadth  of  its  territory. 

6.  It  is  because  of  God  interposing  this  autho¬ 
rity  in  behalf  of  what  is  right,  that,  though  before 
a  mere  ]iropriety  and  therefore  simply  the  obiect 
of  approbation,  it  now'  becomes  a  precept,  and  is 
therefore  matter  of  actual  obligation.  Yet,  apart 


104  GENERAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE. 


fi  OTR  Ibo  authority  of  Go(i,  and,  without  any  refer¬ 
ence  at  the  time  of  our  thoughts  to  him  at  all,  we 
can  talk  not  merely  of  the  rectitude  of  morality 
but  we  can  talk  also  of  the  obligations  of  morality. 
We  in  current  language  extend  the  term  to  the 
v  hole  of  virtue  and  are  quite  intelligible,  when  we 
say  of  a  man — that,  though  not  obliged  in  law  to  some 
certain  performance,  he  is  obliged  to  it  in  honour, 
or  in  conscience,  or  in  common  decency.  But  on 
attentive  reflection  it  will  be  found,  that  wherever 
this  term  is  employed,  there  is  a  responsibility 
always  conceived  upon  the  one  side  to  some  party 
that  hath  a  right  of  cognizance  and  of  judgment 
upon  the  other.  For  example,  the  obligations  of 
conscience  suppose  a  judge  within  our  heart  who 
takes  account  of  our  doings;  and,  according  to 
the  character  of  these,  dispenses  eitlier  rewards  or 
penalties — ministering,  in  the  one  case,  a  honied 
dr.'uight  of  complacency  that  is  most  sweet  and 
satisfying  to  the  soul ;  or,  in  the  other,  by  the 
inflictions  of  remorse,  exercising  it  as  if  with  the 
whip  of  a  secret  tormentor.  And,  in  like  manner, 
in  the  obligations  of  honour  or  conscience  or  de¬ 
cency,  there  is  the  tribunal  of  public  opinion  j  and 
the  collective  voice  of  society  is  the  organ,  either 
of  a  reward  the  most  pleasing,  or  of  a  penalty  the 
most  dreadful.  To  both  the  one  and  the  other 
obligation,  there  is  in  fact  a  correspondent  right. 
Vested  in  that  party  to  which  the  obligation  is 
owing.  When  an  obligation  of  justice  to  another 
man  is  violated,  he  hath  a  right  to  lay  a  compul 
sory  hand  upon  the  person  of  the  transgressor 
When  by  some  secret  and  sohtary  crime  an  obli- 


GENERAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE.  405 

gation  of  conscience  is  violated,  this  man  within  ta« 
heai’t,  as  he  is  termed  by  Dr.  Smith,  hath  the 
right  to  distil  agony  upon  the  bosom  by  the 
whispers  of  his  condemnatory  voice.  When  the 
obligations  of  Honour  or  Decency  are  violated. 
Society  hath  a  right  to  cast  its  contemptuous  looks 
upon  the  offender,  or  lift  against  him  the  outcry  of 
its  appalling  execrations.  An  obligation  implies 
sanction — a  penalty  upon  the  event  of  failure — a 
reward  upon  the  event  of  fulfilment — and  the 
reason  why  approval  and  obligation  run  so  readily 
the  one  into  the  other  is,  that  the  approval,  either 
of  a  man’s  own  heart,  or  of  his  fellows  in  society, 
may  in  truth  be  to  him  the  most  precious  of  all 
gratifications ;  and  the  contrary  disapproval  be  the 
most  afflictive  of  all  calamities. 

7.  It  is  thus  that,  apart  from  all  jurisdiction — 
apart  from  the  observation  of  society — and  apart 
even  from  any  sense  of  God  in  the  heart — it  might 
be  quite  pertinent  to  say,  that  I  am  under  the 
moral  obligation  of  acting -in  some  given  way — 
because  there  is  in  the  heart  a  court  of  conscience 
— and  there  would  a  voice  of  rebuke  be  lifted  there, 
that  might  be  dreaded  and  recoiled  from,  as  the 
most  formidable  of  all  penalties.  This  is  an  obli¬ 
gation  which  exists  in  greatest  strength  in  the 
bosom  of  the  Divinity — in  virtue  of  which  it  may 
be  said,  even  of  Omnipotence,  that  there  are  cer¬ 
tain  things  *wdiich  it  cannot  do — and  so  fully 
warrants  the  language  of  inspiration  that  God 
cannot  lie.  There  is  such  a  necessary  revolt  of 
His  w'hole  nature  from  moral  evil — there  would 
be  such  a  violence  inflicted  by  it  on  the  constitu- 


406  GENERAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE. 

tion  of  the  Godhead,  which  is  at  once  perfect 
and  unchangeable — could  we  dare  to  conceive  it, 
there  would  be  so  deep  an  agony  felt,  in  the  slight¬ 
est  deviation  on  his  part  from  the  rectitude  which 
eternally  and  essentially  belongs  to  Him — that  the 
very  strength  of  His  approbation  for  that  which  is 
good,  and  the  very  strength  of  His  consequent 
recoil  from  that  which  is  wrong,  are  elements 
enough  to  compose  what  may  be  called  an  obliga¬ 
tion  upon  the  Divinity  to  be  virtuous.  It  is  not 
however,  as  with  us,  an  obligation  that  bears  upon 
Him  from  wdthout.  There  is  no  jurisdiction 
foreign  to  Himself,  which  can  take  cognizance  of 
Him,  He  is  not  responsible  at  the  bar  of  a 
higher  than  Himself,  even  as  we  are  at  the  bar  of 
Him  who  is  the  supreme  governor  of  the  universe. 
Obligation  as  acting  upon  Him  is  approbation,  of 
a  strength  and  power  that  carry  it  up  to  the  de¬ 
gree  of  a  moral  necessity.  But  obligation  acting 
upon  us,  while  the  term  may  be  applied  and  often 
is  to  the  force  of  those  sanctions  which  virtue  has 
even  in  the  workings  of  our  own  conscience,  has 
more  strictly  a  reference  to  the  sanctions  of  that 
divine  government,  which  is  set  up  in  authority 
over  us — and,  though  it  may  be  said  of  us  that  we 
are  obliged  to  act  virtuously,  else  w'e  should  incur 
the  agor%s  of  remorse,  or  the  horrors  of  public 
obloquy,  or  even  the  penalties  of  human  law — yet 
far  more  emphatically  may  it  be  said^  that  we  are 
obliged  to  act  virtuously,  else  we  should  incur  tlie 
frown  of  a  Lawgiver  who  is  on  high — the  adverse 
judgments  of  Him,  from  the  rebuke  of  whose  coun¬ 
tenance,  this  earth  and  these  heavens  shall  flee  away. 


GENERAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE.  407 

8.  Did  we  only  give  a  distinct  place  in  our  un 
derstanding,  to  each  of  two  things  which  are  dis 
tinct  and  distinguishable  the  one  from  the  other, 
it  might  help  to  unravel  some  of  the  perplexities, 
that  attend  certain  of  the  abstract  and  general 
questions  in  moral  science.  We  again  advert  to 
moral  approbation  and  moral  obligation.  By  the 
one  moral  rectitude  is  a  thing  esteemed,  by  the 
other  it  is  a  thing  enforced.  In  virtue  of  the  one, 
it  is  followed  up  by  esteem  when  it  is  observed, 
and  by  disgrace  when  it  is  violated.  In  virtue 
of  the  other  it  is  followed  up  by  reward  when 
observed,  and  by  penalties  when  violated.  There 
are  two  aspects  in  which  virtue  may  be  regarded, 
either  as  a  matter  of  approval  or  as  a  matter  of 
authority — and  it  is  from  the  blending  or  mingling 
together  of  these  two  aspects,  that  a  certain  cloudi¬ 
ness  has  arisen,  by  which  the  metaphysique  of  the 
more  elementary  investigations  in  Ethics  has  been 
greatly  overshaded. 

9.  The  distinctness  of  these  two  things  is  very 
well  kept  up,  in  the  judgment  and  the  jurispru¬ 
dence  ot  society.  There  is  a  clear  line  of  separa¬ 
tion  between  the  moralities  which  are  within,  and 
those  which  are  without  the  proper  boundaries  of 
juridical  cognizance  and  control.  One  needs 
only  advert  for  an  exemplification,  to  the  debt  of 
justice,  and  the  debt  of  gratitude.  The  payment 
of  the  one  is  a  morality  which  at  the  bar  of  politi¬ 
cal  law,  is  also  a  matter  of  obligation.  The  pay¬ 
ment  of  the  other  is  no  less  a  morality,  but,  not 
being  the  subject  of  a  legal  enforcement,  it  is 
simply  a  matter  of  approval.  So  far  the  obliga- 


408  GENERAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE. 

tion  and  the  approbation  are  not  confounded — and 
equally  distinct  from  eacn  other  with  these,  are  the 
right  that  is  correspondent  to  the  former,  and  the 
rightness  that  is  correspondent  to  the  latter  of  them. 

10.  But  there  is  a  reason  that  we  have  already 
glanced  at,  which  hath  carried  the  forensic  term 
obligation  beyond  the  limits  of  the  forum ;  and  it 
is  here  that  the  ambiguity  begins.  There  are 
certain  analogies  between  that  legal  judicatory 
where  the  question  of  right  is  pronounced  upon, 
and  those  other  judicatories  where  the  question  of 
rightness  is  pronounced  upon.  We  often  hear  of 
the  man  whom  law  cannot  reach,  having  still  a 
trial  to  undergo,  at  the  bar  of  his  own  conscience, 
or  at  the  bar  of  public  opinion — and  it  is  not  to  be 
wondered  at,  that  the  terms  or  the  technicalities 
primarily  applied  to  the  former,  should  all  have 
been  extended  to  the  latter — more  especially  that, 
both  in  the  court  of  conscience  and  the  court  of 
p  iblic  opinion,  there  are  rewards  and  penalties 
wherewith  the  decision  in  each  of  them  is  followed 
up.  Were  we  so  constituted  that  the  judgments 
ourselves  form  of  our  own  conduct,  affected  us  no 
more  than  the  judgment  we  have  of  our  own  sta¬ 
ture,  or  of  our  own  complexion,  the  analogy  would 
have  failed — and  we  should  no  longer  have  fancied 
a  tribunal  within  the  heart,  whose  awards  had  the 
sanctions  of  a  similar  force  to  those  of  law  by 
which  they  are  upholden.  But  we  are  not  so 
constituted — and  the  state  of  the  matter  is,  that 
the  approving  testimony  of  our  own  hearts  is  the 
most  pleasing  of  all  gratifications,  and  its  reproof 
the  most  pungent  and  intolerable  of  all  agonies. 


GENERAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE.  409 


Neither  are  we  so  constituted,  as  to  be  alike  indif¬ 
ferent  to  the  general  voice  in  regard  to  the  recti¬ 
tude  of  our  own  character,  and  to  the  same  gene¬ 
ral  voice  in  regard  to  any  other  matter  of  specu¬ 
lation— to  the  figure  of  the  earth  for  example,  or 
the  truth  of  the  Copernican  system.  There  is  not 
a  more  delicious  recompense  than  that  of  public 
esteem,  or  a  more  dreadful  chastisement  than  that 
of  disgrace  in  the  eyes  of  our  fellows  in  society, 
feo  that  here  too,  we  have  the  appendages  of  a 
court,  a  judgment,  and  a  sentence  ;  and,  should  it 
be  an  adverse  sentence,  a  most  tremendous  weight 
of  damages— so  that  it  is  no  longer  marvellous, 
how  the  approbation  either  by  ourselves  or  others 
of  the  moralities  of  life,  and  the  obligation  to  per¬ 
form  them  have  come  to  be  implicated  together _ 

why  that  which  strictly  and  properly  is  the  coun¬ 
terpart  of  a  legal  right,  should  further  have  been 

extended  into  a  counterpart  of  all  rightness _ so 

that  Ave  not  merely  speak  of  being  under  a  legal 
obligation  or  an  obligation  at  law  to  pay  our  debts 
of  justice — but  that,  in  reference  to  our  duties  of 
gratitude  and  kindness  and  self-command,  we  are 
under  either  the  obligations  of  conscience  or  the 
obligations  of  honour  and  decency. 

11.  There  is  therefore  ground  for  the  distinc¬ 
tion  between  the  rightness  of  a  given  performance 
and  the  obligation  of  it.  It  is  said  to  be  right 
because  of  its  moral  propriety.  It  is  said  to  be 
obligatory  because  of  the  sanctions  whether  of 
reward  or  penalty  that  bind  to  the  doing  of  it. 
The  distinction  is  clearly  and  literally  exemplified 
ip  civil  law,  under  which  there  are  many  actions 

VQI,.  ,.  s 


410  general  questions  of  moral  science. 

that  are  obligatory  in  the  strictest  sense  of  the 
term,  but  many  more  which  morally  are  right,  but 
legally  are  not  at  all  binding.  The  distinction  is 
observed  again  in  passing  from  a  court  of  law  to 
the  court  of  conscience  or  the  court  of  public 
opinion — for  there  the  obligation  is  far  more  widely 
extended  over  the  moral  territory — and  not  only 
so,  but  the  term  itself  is  of  a  more  loose  and 
figurative  application  than  it  bears  in  jurisprudence. 
Passing  from  these  again  to  the  court  of  the  Divine 
government,  the  term  obligation  is  restored  to  that 
precisely  forensic  or  juridical  import  which  it  has 
under  the  economy  of  human  law — and  with  this 
difference  that  it  is  not  restricted  like  the  others 
to  the  enforcement  of  justice  alone.  God  hath 
assumed  the  lawgiver  over  his  creatures — and  He 
has  framed  a  code,  not  of  equity  alone,  but  of 
universal  morality  ;  and  He  hath  extended  this 
heavenly  jurisprudence  over  the  whole  length  and 
breadth  of  human  virtue ;  and  under  Him  those 
moralities  v/hich  are  left  free  and  ought  to  be  so 
in  the  administrations  of  an  earthly  jurisprudence, 
have  become  so  many  imperative  enactments  which 
at  our  peril  we  disobey — in  so  much  that  charity, 
forgiveness,  nay  even  the  habitual  sympathies  of 
a  good  and  benevolent  heart — the  affections  as  well 
as  the  acts  of  humanity,  are  one  and  all  of  them 
legalized. 

12.  We  cannot  but  perceive,  that,  under  such 
an  economy,  there  is  not  one  of  the  moralities  of 
human  character,  that  is  not  alike  the  object  of  an 
approbation  and  the  subject  of  an  obligation.  It 
IS  not  so  under  a  human  government ;  for  /low 


GENERAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE.  411 

many  are  the  virtues  which  we  may  highly  approve 
but  to  the  observation  of  which  we  are  not  at  all 
bound  by  the  law  of  the  state  ?  In  the  govern¬ 
ment  of  natural  conscience  again,  as  in  the  govern¬ 
ment  of  public  opinion,  the  approbation  and  the 
obligation  are  in  a  manner  so  implicated  together 
— that  the  distinctness  of  the  two  is  not  readily 
apprehended.  In  the  approbation,  in  fact,  lie  the 
only  sanctions  that  constitute  the  obligation  of 
morality,  under  either  the  one  or  other  of  these 
governments.  It  is  the  delight  of  self-compla¬ 
cency  when  the  approbation  is  given — it  is  the 
dreadfulness  of  remorse  when  the  approbation  is 
reversed — these  are  what  often  give  an  authority 
to  the  court  of  conscience  equal  to  that  of  a  court 
of  law  :  And  again  it  is  the  charm  of  an  applauding 
testimony  from  our  fellows  that  constitutes  a 
reward,  and  the  horror  of  their  condemnatory 
voice  that  constitutes  a  penalty ;  and  which,  both 
together,  give  such  effective  authority  to  a  court 
of  public  opinion.  The  obligation  lies  enveloped 
in  the  approbation — but  the  two  separate  and 
spread  out  into  greater  distinctness,  under  the 
Divine  government.  It  is  true  that  the  simple  ap¬ 
probation  of  God  may  carry  in  itself  the  most 
precious  and,  exhilarating  of  all  rewards  ;  and  that 
the  rebuke  of  His  adverse  judgment  may,  separately 
and  alone,  be  so  manifested  as  to  become  the  most 
intolerable  of  all  penalties — still  the  universal  per¬ 
suasion  is  that  under  the  administration  of  the 
supreme  Lawgiver,  his  judgment  will  be  followed 
up  by  other  sanctions — that  crowns  of  glory  and 
rivers  of  purest  gladness,  and  all  the  bliss  and 


412  GENERAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE. 

beauty  of  an  immortal  Elysium,  will  come  in  the 
train  of  righteousness — and  that,  in  the  train  of 
moral  evil,  there  will  not  only  be  a  condemnation 
but  a  vengeance ;  and  that,  in  counterpart  to  the 
high  and  joyful  preferments  of  eternity,  there  will 
be  its  dreary  prison-house,  its  lake  of  living  agony, 
its  woe  and  its  wretchedness  irremediable. 

13.  The  question  “What  is  the  object  of  moral 
approbation?”  has  originated  many  theories.  It 
might  be  translated  into  the  question — “  Wherein 
doth  virtue  consist?” — nor  is  it  practically  different 
from  the  question — “  What  is  it  that  constitutes 
virtue  ?^’  Should  one  aver  that  the  virtue  of  an 
action  consists  in  its  usefulness — and  another  that 
it  is  the  will  of  God  which  constitutes  the  virtue 
of  usefulness — the  latter  makes  the  virtue  of  an 
action  consist  in  its  conformity  to  this  will. 

14.  Did  the  whole  of  virtue  lie  in  a  conformity 
to  the  Divine  will,  then  nothing  would  be  felt  or 
apprehended  as  virtuous,  but  in  as  far  as  the  will 
of  God  appeared  in  it.  In  order  to  have  a  sense 
of  its  virtuousness,  there  behoved  to  be  a  sight  of 
this  its  essential  and  constituting  quality.  Ere  I 
could  give  the  homage  of  my  moral  approbation  to 
a  deed  of  justice,  I  must  first  see  that  God  had 
willed  or  that  God  had  ordained  it.  Now,  with 
every  allowance  for  the  rapidity  which  is  ascribed 
to  the  habitual  processes  of  the  mind,  it  does  ap¬ 
pear  very  obvious,  that  justice  directly  and  instantly 
announces  its  own  moral  rightness  to  the  eye  of  an 
observer — that  it  is  felt  to  be  virtuous  without  any 
reference  of  the  mind  to  God  at  all — and  was  so 
felt,  at  the  first,  without  any  prior  education  in  the 


GFNFRAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE.  413 

]urisprudence  of  Heaven,  or  any  thought  of  a 
mandate  from  heaven’s  sovereign.  Though  earth 
had,  with  all  its  present  accommodations  and  with 
the  actual  constitution  which  man  now  has,  been 
placed  beyond  the  limits  of  this  sovereignty,  still 
he  wmuld  have  carried  a  sense  of  moral  distinctions 
along  with  him,  and  met  with  objects  of  moral 
approbation — even  with  a  mind  desolated  of  all 
its  conceptions  of  a  God.  Though  astronomy 
were  obliterated  from  the  human  mind,  still  might 
it  retain  its  mathematics;  and,  though  now  de¬ 
barred  from  the  sublime  application  of  its  princi¬ 
ples  to  those  upper  regions,  there  remain  objects 
upon  earth  whereof  the  equalities  or  the  propor¬ 
tions  of  this  science  might  be  clearly  demonstrated. 
And  though  all  Theology  were  in  like  manner 
expunged  from  the  world,  and  those  moralities 
were  no  longer  felt  that  spring  from  the  grand 
relation  between  the  human  family  and  their  God 
— still  would  there  subsist  the  moral  equities  and 
proprieties  of  all  the  mutual  relations,  that  obtain 
among  the  members  of  this  family.  Justice  and 
humanity  and  truth,  even  in  this  economy  of 
atheism,  would  be  recognised.  They  would  come 
forth  in  occasional  exhibition  by  actors  upon  the 
scene  ;  and  when  they  did  so,  they  would  be  re¬ 
sponded  to  by  the  approval  of  spectators.  The 
very  admiration  of  integrity — the  very  indignancy 
at  deceit,  which  now  actuate  the  hearts  of  men, 
and  come  forth  in  a  voice  of  moral  judgment  upon 
their  fellow's,  w'ould  still  have  busy  circulation  in 
society ;  and  men  would  not  only  love  and  resent 
and  be  grateful,  but  they  would  applaud  and  con- 


414  GENERAL  {QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE. 

demn  and  have  the  same  speech  and  the  same 
sentiment  both  of  deeds  and  characters  as  before, 
15.  It  is  thus  that  we  dispose  of  the  system  of 
Dr.  Paley,  by  which  he  would  resolve  virtue,  not 
into  any  native  or  independent  rightness  of  its  own, 
but  into  the  will  of  Him  who  has  this  right  to  all 
our  services.  Without  disparagement  to  the  Su¬ 
preme  Being,  we  have  affirmed,  that  it  is  not  His 
law  which  constitutes  virtue  ;*  but,  far  higher 
homage  both  to  Him  and  to  His  law,  that  it  is  the 
law  which  derives  all  its  authority  and  its  being 
from  a  virtue  of  anterior  residence  in  the  charac¬ 
ter  of  the  Divinity.  It  may  have  served  to  com¬ 
plicate  our  notions  upon  this  subject,  that  there  is 
a  real  independent  rightness  in  our  obedience  to  God. 
We  believe  it  to  have  been  the  urgent  feeling  of  this, 
which  led  to  what  has  been  called  the  tenet  of  the 
theological  moralists ;  and  which  still  in  some 
instances  animates  their  vindication  of  it.  What 
more  obviously  incumbent,  it  is  said,  thaii  for  the 
creature  to  give  himself  up  in  absolute  and  entire 
dedication  to  the  will  of  the  Creator — than  for  him 
who  receives  every  breath  and  every  faculty  and 
every  enjoyment,  to  consecrate  them  all  to  the 
service  of  their  owner — than  for  the  thing  that  is 
made  to  be  the  servant  of  Him  who  made  it,  and 
to  devote  all  the  hours  of  a  grateful  existence 
to  Him  by  whose  sustaining  energy  it  is,  that  we 
have  a  part  and  a  continuance  in  the  land  of 
living  men?  There  is  no  plea  of  justice  or  of  grati¬ 
tude  that  can  be  urged  against  us  by  our  fellows 


Natural  Theology,  Book  iv.  chap.  vi.  §  24. 


GENERAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE.  415 

in  society,  to  which  any  moral  sense  that  is  in  us 
will  more  vividly  respond,  than  to  this  plea  for  our 
subjection  and  our  loyalty  on  the  part  of  God. 
But  our  very  recognition  of  this  presupposes  in  it 
an  independent  sense  of  virtue  in  man.  It  is 
not  the  commandment  which  puts  this  sense  into 
us ;  but  it  is  this  sense  which  gives  us  to  feel 
the  rightness  of  doing  the  commandment.  Or,  in 
other  words,  there  is  a  morality  not  constituted  by 
the  authority  of  law,  however  much  it  may  pre¬ 
scribe  our  obedience  to  law — not  the  creation  of 
God’s  arbitrary  will,  however  much  it  may  pre¬ 
scribe  our  conformity  to  that  will — a  morality  that, 
without  the  aid  of  any  jurisprudence,  will  pro¬ 
nounce  upon  the  rightness  of  all  our  justice  and 
gratitude,  and  humanity  to  all  our  brethren  of  the 
species;  and  that,  when  a  jurisprudence  from  heaven 
is  made  known  to  us,  will  also  pronounce  on  the 
rightness  of  our  submission  thereunto.  T!«e  eter¬ 
nal  God  was  not  the  subject  of  any  jurisdiction ; 
but  took  of  himself  independent  cognizance  of  the 
morally  right  and  the  morally  wrong.  We  in  virtue 
of  our  relation  to  Him  as  creatures  are  the  sub¬ 
jects  of  a  jurisdiction;  but,  in  virtue  of  being 
formed  after  his  likeness,  we  can  take  the  same 
independent  cognizance  also. 

16.  When  God  bids  us  do  what  before  was  a 
matter  of  indifference,  it  thence  becomes  a  matter 
of  obligation ;  and  that,  not  more  from  his  right  of 
command,  than  from  the  rightness  of  our  obedience. 
When  he  bids  us  do  what  before  was  felt  on  our 
part  to  be  an  act  of  virtue,  he  only  attaches  one 
obligation  more  to  the  performance  of,  it.  It  did 


4i6  GENERAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCIE. 

not  for  the  first  time  become  virtuous,  at  the 
moment  He  embarked  his  authority  in  its  favour. 
But  He  may  be  said  to  have  rendered  it  more  an 
act  of  virtue  than  before.  He  superadded  upon 
it  one  rightness  to  another,  which  is  by  no  means 
a  singularity  in  the  affairs  of  human  conduct. 
When  God  interposes  with  the  expression  of  His 
will  on  the  side  of  a  morality,  there  is  then  added 
to  the  call  of  morality  the  call  of  godliness.  It 
is  just  the  same  when  a  benefactor  tells  us  of  the 
WTetchedness  into  which  he  has  fallen,  and  im¬ 
plores  our  sympathy.  There  is  then  added  to 
the  call  of  humanity  the  call  of  gratitude. 

17.  The  distinction  which  we  now  labour  to  im¬ 
press  is  of  more  than  speculative  importance 
When  He  who  has  the  right  of  command  lays 
upon  us  a  commandment,  there  is  a  rightness  in 
our  obedience ;  and  when  prompted  by  a  sense  of 
this  rightness  to  obey,  there  may  be  as  much  in 
of  pure  virtue,  as  when  spontaneously  prompted 
to  any  deed  of  beneficence  or  honour.  Bu? 
when  with  Him  who  has  the  right,  there  is  also 
lodged  the  power  of  enforcement — when,  in  addi¬ 
tion  to  the  moral  truth  of  His  law,  there  is  the 
tremendousness  of  those  sanctions  which  a  God  of 
holiness  hath  ordained  and  which  it  lies  with  the 
hand  of  his  omnipotence  to  execute — when  anger 
and  punishment  and  thcj  threats  of  destruction  or  of 
eterna’.  wretchedness,  when  these  are  brought  in 
a-s  auxiliaries  to  the  course  of  obedience — then  obe¬ 
dience,  when  thus  forced  and  driven  on,  may  change 
its  character  altogether.  There  may  be  a  bidden 
conformity  with  the  hand  from  which  the  heart 


GENERAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE.  417 

utterly  revolts,  and  revolts  the  more,  because  of 
the  hard  and  the  hateful  necessity  which  constrains 
it.  It  is  thus  that  the  history  of  the  outer  man, 
may  exhibit  the  semblance  and  the  skeleton  of 
virtue,  while  the  spirit  of  it  has  fled.  Terror  is 
an  animal  and  not  a  moral  influence ;  and,  under 
its  gloomy  reign,  there  may  be  a  thousand  vexa¬ 
tious  drudgeries  having  the  body  without  the 
breath,  the  letter  without  the  living  worth  or 
principle  of  righteousness. 

18.  When  one  is  virtuous  from  a  spontaneous 
principle  of  his  own,  he  may  be  of  a  character 
altogether  unlike  to  one  who  is  virtuous  in  con¬ 
duct,  after  that  a  Lawgiver,  armed  with  the  irre¬ 
sistible  power  to  punish  and  to  destroy,  hath 
appeared  on  the  side  of  virtue.  When  these  two 
elements  are  complicated  together,  as  they  appear 
to  be,  under  the  economy  of  our  existing  moral 
government,  it  may  be  extremely  difficult  to  assign 
the  precise  kind  or  character  of  our  obedience. 
It  may  even  very  naturally  be  thought,  that  the 
now  superadded  terror  will  overbear  the  better 
and  the  more  generous  principle  altogether;  and 
reduce  what  might  Luve  been  the  willing  services 
of  love  and  liberty,  to  the  crouching  servilities  of 
bondsmen.  At  all  events,  it  is  evident,  that  it  is 
only  when  rendered  in  the  spirit  of  a  free  and 
a  heaven-born  sacredness,  that  they  can  at  all  be 
recognised  as  the  genuine  emanations  of  a  right 
principle  within;  and  they  instantly  degenerate 
into  the  selfish  and  the  sordid,  when  they  are  but 
extorted  offerings,  under  the  law  and  the  lash  of 
authority.  Till  these  two  elements  then  be  dis- 


418  GENERAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE. 

entangled,  it  is  truly  difficult  to  appreciate  the 
quality  of  any  performance,  which,  in  the  matter 
of  it  may  be  right,  but  which  in  the  motive  of  it 
may  differ  as  widely,  as  the  ecstatic  delight  of  a 
seraph  does  from  the  ignoble  drudgery  of  a  slave. 
It  is  indispensable  to  virtue,  that  it  be  done  con 
amove ;  and  any  thing  else  that  wears  its  resem¬ 
blance,  or  passes  under  its  name,  is  but  low  and 
wretched  drivelling.  We  have  ever  held  it  to  be 
one  chief  recommendation  of  the  evangelical  sys¬ 
tem,  that,  by  it  alone,  the  disentanglement  in 
question  has  been  effected ;  that,  by  means  of  its 
leading  principle,  it,  at  one  and  the  same  time, 
releases  us  from  the  terrors  of  the  law  and  inspires 
us  with  a  taste  for  its  services ;  that  what  before 
we  toiled  and  drivelled  at  in  the  spirit  of  bondage, 
becomes,  under  its  influence  a  service  of  gratitude 
and  good-will;  that  it  removes  from  our  view 
those  menaces  and  penalties,  the  terror  of  which 
overhung  and  polluted  all  our  attempts  after  recti¬ 
tude  ;  and  so  gives  space  and  emancipation  to  its 
disciples,  for  breaking  forth  with  alacrity  upon  a 
way— which,  whether  it  respects  the  vigour  and 
variety  of  the  performances  or  the  principle  by 
which  they  are  animated,  may  well  be  termed  a 
way  of  new  obedience. 

19.  We  have  heard  the  epithet  of  god-like 
annexed  even  to  human  virtue,  in  its  best  and 
loftiest  exhibitions ;  and  it  must  be  confessed,  that 
this  is  the  highest  of  all  possible  designations. 
But  God  is  not  under  the  force  or  authority  of  any 
law,  that  is  exoteric  to  Himself.  He  stands  at  no 
bai  of  jurisprudence;  and,  save  from  the  ultro- 


GENERAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCE.  419 

neous  repugnance  to  evil  of  His  own  native 
sanctity,  there  is  no  obligation  upon  Him  for  the 
moralities  of  that  supreme  righteousness  which 
marks  all  the  doings  and  all  the  dispensations  of 
heaven’s  Sovereign.  Every  act  of  the  Deity, 
instead  of  coming  forth  of  an  impulse  from  with¬ 
out,  is  an  emanation  from  the  fountain-head  of  his 
own  character.  And  unless  there  be  a  well  similar 
to  this,  struck  out  in  the  bosom  of  regenerated 
man,  and  whence  there  may  proceed  the  willing 
performances  of  him  who  deals  in  virtue  because 
he  delights  in  it — there  is  nought  of  the  divinity  in 
his  character ;  and,  let  the  offerings  be  what  they 
may  which  fear  or  force  has  extorted,  he  is  but  an 
earth-born  slave.  It  is  the  high  achievement  of 
Christianity,  to  infuse  a  taste  for  the  services  of 
the  law,  while  it  utterly  does  away  the  terror  of 
its  penalties;  and  the  disciple  who  best  under¬ 
stands  and  hath  most  fully  imbibed  its  spirit,  now 
under  the  operation  of  a  principle  more  generous 
than  fear,  abounds  in  all  the  deeds  and  the  desires 
of  virtue,  not  because  virtue  is  his  task,  but  because 
it  is  that  pure  and  healthful  element  in  which  he 
most  loves  to  expatiate. 

20.  This  should  suffice  for  the  question,  wnether 
virtue  have  a  rightness  in  itself  or  if  all  its  right¬ 
ness  be  only  derived  from  the  will  of  God.  It 
will  be  perceived  that  virtue  hath  a  higher  original 
than  the  will  of  God,  even  the  character  of  God — . 
or  those  principles  in  the  constitution  of  the  Deity, 
which  give  direction  to  his  will.  Long  ere  virtue 
passed  into  a  law  for  the  government  of  those  who 
are  creatad,  had  it  a  residence  and  a  being  in  ttie 


420  GENERAL  QUESTIONS  OF  MORAL  SCIENCEo 

mind  of  the  Creator  ;  and  the  tablet  of  His  juris¬ 
prudence  is  but  a  transcript  from  the  tablet  of  His 
own  independent  nature.  To  have  a  nature  like 
unto  his,  we  must  love  virtue  for  itself ;  and  do  it 
because  it  is  right — not  because  it  is  the  requisi¬ 
tion  of  authority.  If  it  be  the  fear  of  theological 
moralists,  lest  this  principle  should  cast  us  loose 
from  the  authority  of  God,  we  hold  a  deference  to 
this  authority  to  be  the  highest  of  all  rightness. 
We  affirm  that  whenever  virtue,  though  in  its  own 
original  and  independent  character,  hath  taken 
possession  of  the  heart — its  first  and  largest  offer¬ 
ings  will  be  to  the  Divinity  who  inspired  it ;  or 
rather,  that,  in  the  unfailing  gratitude  due  to  that 
supreme  benefactor  who  upholds  us  continually, 
and  in  the  constant  moral  esteem  of  those  virtues 
by  which  His  person  and  His  throne  are  irradiated, 
there  will  be  the  incense  of  a  perpetual  offering. 


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